


Yuuri Forgetting, by Viktor Forgot

by Mats



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: (I did and I wrote it.), Alternate Universe - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind Fusion, Angst, Bittersweet, Chaptered, Cohabitation, Depression, Domestic Fluff, Drama & Romance, EVERYTHING IS INTENTIONAL, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Roller Coaster, Established Relationship, Fluff, Heavy Angst, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Injury, Long-Haired Victor Nikiforov, M/M, Memories, Memory Alteration, Memory Loss, Mild Language, Minor Character Death, Non-Chronological, Non-Explicit Sex, Post-Canon, Regret, Relationship Problems, Repressed Memories, You might cry, eternal sunshine au, memory loss au, so I went with Mature just to be safe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2017-08-21
Packaged: 2018-12-03 00:16:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 45,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11520513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mats/pseuds/Mats
Summary: Viktor, now retired and acting as an assistant coach to Yakov, has fallen into a monotonous routine. Every day is the same and nothing excites him anymore. It’s not a hard life, but it’s not a fulfilling one. When he takes the wrong bus to the rink one morning, he meets Yuuri Katsuki, a former skater who may be able to give him just the thing he’s been missing... again.A post-canon memory loss/Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind AU.





	1. Tabula Rasa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Blank slate_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic was inspired by the movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, though it will not be following the events of the movie. It's more just the foundation. (But if you've never seen it, I recommend it!) Also, this story is not told in chronological order, so enjoy piecing everything together!

_How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!/ The world forgetting, by the world forgot/ Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!/ Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd_

**-from “Eloisa to Abelard” by Alexander Pope**

~~~

He’s been retired for over a year now, but Viktor Nikiforov keeps the morning routine of his competitive days. Wake up at five o’clock in the morning, use the bathroom, put on a pot of coffee, one hundred sit-ups with feet hooked under the couch, toast two slices of bread before smearing them with honey or sometimes (when he’s feeling indulgent) cream cheese, have a cup of coffee (black) with breakfast, fifty push-ups, a shower, brush and floss, get dressed, style hair, take the 6:56 bus to the rink.

There _are_ some slight differences, of course, from the days of the past. For one, his hair skims the tops of his shoulders now and takes longer to wash, dry, and brush out. He wears it long in an attempt to balance out the hairline that seems to be creeping further up his forehead bit by bit. He’s deathly afraid that given a few more years, his head will match that of his former coach, so he spends a lot of time and money on expensive thickening creams.

Second, the bus he takes now is actually fifteen minutes earlier than the one he used to take. Back then, before he’d retired, he’d take his dog on a morning walk sometime between breakfast and sit-ups. But Makkachin died two years back and it must have traumatized him because Viktor barely remembers the actual events that led up to his companion’s passing. He just remembers the pain of his absence. In any case, there’s no reason to hang around the apartment longer than he has to, so he takes the earlier bus.

Lastly, although Viktor still goes to the skating hall almost every day, it’s not to practice. It’s to assist Yakov Feltsman, who, after being diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, has become less able to keep up with new, fresh-faced talent and has to do most of his coaching while sitting behind the boards. Viktor has taken over as his man on the ice with the newer recruits. He also has taken over most of eighteen-year-old World Champion Yuri Plisetsky’s coaching and has become a sought after choreographer among the Russian teens who are preparing for their senior debuts and hoping to follow in Yuri’s history-making footsteps.

This morning starts as usual. Five o’clock on the nose, his alarm goes off and he opens his eyes, rolls out of bed, takes a piss, and stumbles into the kitchen to put on a pot of coffee. This morning, however, there’s a half-empty bottle of whiskey on the counter; the lid sits next to it in a small, sticky puddle. He vaguely recalls the previous night: standing at his counter and downing his alcohol straight from the bottle, savoring the burn, trying not to sputter. It’d been a poor response to the dread he felt, no _feels_ , about the start Yakov’s annual summer camp for international skaters which, Yakov had told (not offered, not suggested... _told_ ) him, would essentially become _Viktor’s_ summer camp this year.

He screws the lid on and returns the bottle to its rightful place in a cabinet hanging just next to the refrigerator, right between a bottle of the cheaper brand he usually drinks and an untouched bottle of rice wine. He doesn’t remember when he acquired it or from who, but it’s been there unopened for a while now. Viktor never pays much attention to it. It’s just a fixture in his cabinet, like the bottle of tequila Chris gave him once that sits in the back because Viktor hates the stuff. His eyes tend to ghost over the rice wine while searching for more familiar tastes. But this morning, the label catches his attention.

Pulling it down and turning it in his hands, he studies the printed characters, made to look like thick, black brush strokes over a gold background. Below the characters is a sketch of a Japanese-style castle. Viktor tries hard to remember where this bottle came from, and it’s just then that a streak of lightning runs over the top of his head, sharp and piercing. He smooths a hand over path it took, from front to back, but it’s gone in an instant and there doesn’t seem to be a follow-up. He should really limit his alcohol consumption to the weekends. He’s no spring chicken anymore. He can’t power through hangovers like he used to.

After returning the mystery bottle to its place, Viktor closes the cabinet and goes about preparing the coffee maker, after which he moves into the living room for his sit-ups. That’s the plan anyway, but Viktor has a hard time letting The Case of the Unknown Alcohol go. It doesn’t matter how hard he tries to concentrate on contracting his core muscles or keeping his neck straight; he can’t seem to keep a consistent rhythm between each bend of his abdomen when his mind is elsewhere. After the thirty-fourth sit-up, he gives up.

The coffee pot clicks over to standby, and Viktor is already running behind schedule.

* * *

 

The bus idles next to the bench that marks the street-side stop, but Viktor can’t make himself run for it. His legs are like granite; he isn’t looking forward to gaggles of hormonal teenage skaters, and his whole morning has been thrown off by a _bottle of liquor._ It’s ridiculous. Maybe this is what happens when skaters retire and suddenly have too much time to think— they get hung up on the most trivial stuff just to keep life interesting. The bus pulls away without him, and somehow, Viktor is relieved. It’s another shake-up in his schedule and enough of An Event for his brain to finally switch tracks.

Twenty minutes until the next bus. The bench is chipping paint and rusted through in some parts. On any other day, Viktor would have avoided it at all costs lest it damage the fabric of his favorite pair of light blue Italian-made trousers. But on any other day, he wouldn’t have even had the chance to sit on the bench because he wouldn’t have missed the bus in the first place. On _this_ day, he flops down onto the bench without a second thought and pulls out his phone to send a message to Yakov.

_< < I know the summer camp starts today, but I missed my bus. I’ll be late, sorry. Maybe you should take the lead today so I can observe how you do things anyway. Please tell Yura I’m ordering him to take it easy on his warmups. He got new boots the other day and he’s rushing to break them in. He’s going to overdo it showing off for all the temporary students and hurt himself. >>_

Yakov won’t reply. He never does because, he says, typing is a waste of his time. He reads whatever his skaters send him, but if he needs to continue the conversation, he calls back immediately. (And in actuality, he almost never calls back, preferring instead to rant once he’s got his target face to face.)

Just as he pockets his phone, another bus approaches the stop. This one is headed in the opposite direction of Yubileyny Sports Palace; it drops off at Tauride Gardens, an expanse of greenery and crisscrossing footpaths that sit behind a garish eighteenth-century palace with a hideous green roof that bears the same name and now houses a governmental assembly of some kind or another. Viktor knows Saint Petersburg like the back of his hand. He knows almost every alley and backstreet. He’s seen all of the sights enough times to be confident that he could easily become a paid tour guide at most of them. But he’s never been to Tauride. Or had he? Maybe he’d strolled through it after a night out drinking, or maybe he’d visited on one of the rare non-skating-related outings Yakov took him on during the off-season when he was still a junior athlete and missing home. It’s hard to be sure.

And now the bus that isn’t his is pulling up to the curb, the door is opening with a screech that is begging to be remedied with grease, and Viktor is inexplicably on his feet, stepping up into the cavern of the city bus and slipping into an empty aisle seat near the back. As the bus departs, Viktor can see his future flash before his eyes. Yakov is going to scream hard enough for the veins on his bald head to visibly throb. Viktor will deal with that when the time comes, but he’s already going to be late. A little later won’t hurt much (he tells himself); he’s going to visit the gardens.

Riders fill in nearly every seat; a few people remain standing, stabilized by metal poles or handles on the back of aisle seats. Viktor rides the same bus every day. It follows that the faces are usually the same and thus require no real scrutiny of his surroundings. This new bus, however, offers a whole sea of new faces, and Viktor takes his time taking them in. A woman with dark bags under her eyes and her chestnut hair pulled into a messy bun sits near the front with a small child— a girl in a blue dress with white ribbons— and is rummaging through a worn leather bag while the girl complains about still being hungry. Two teenagers in ripped jeans and vivid streaks of color through their blonde hair are whispering to each other and then laughing loudly, much to the dismay of the older gentleman who is scowling at them from across the aisle. The large man in the seat directly in front of Viktor is slumped forward and snoring lightly; the older woman next to him, presumably his wife, periodically shoves his shoulder and mutters gentle pleas for him to try and stay awake for once.

The Asian man next to him, with a dark shock of hair hanging over his forehead, captures Viktor’s attention next. He’s handsome in a completely unassuming way— soft features but a strong jaw, an elegant neck, thick blue frames set before deep brown eyes. He’s leaning against the window with a notepad in his lap, which he taps incessantly with a pen. The tinny sounds of a trilling piano drift from white earbuds— a piece Viktor vaguely recognizes. Russian composer, probably. It’s rude, he knows, but he lets his gaze drift down to the memo the man is dirtying with endless taps of ink to paper.

It’s a double column list with time signatures on the left and a specialized shorthand on the right: 3A(?), 4L+1T+2A, FSSp. It’s a language Viktor knows well— the language of choreography for figure skating. There are others notes and annotations written in the margins in both English (also a language that Viktor knows well) and, is that Japanese?

At thirty years old, Viktor has ( _finally_ , Yakov likes to say in exasperation) matured. He’s better able to keep his impulses in check. He gets excited _about_ things (however rarely), but he’s not _excitable_ in the way he used to be. Still, there are times when his younger self sneaks out and does something a little reckless. This is one of those times.

The Asian man startles when Viktor reaches over and plucks the earbud from his right ear.

“Are you a figure skater?” he asks in English, pointing to the pad.

The man presses himself further into the window. His eyes are wide and trained on Viktor, uncertain and searching. Maybe he doesn’t understand?

“English?” Viktor inquires, pointing a finger at the other rider’s chest.

Slowly, the man nods. “Yes. I am. Was. A figure skater, I mean.”

“Was?”

“Um.”

“Me, too.” It’s a feeble attempt to make a connection. Handing over the earbud he still pinches between his fingers, he clarifies, “I’m... I _was_ a figure skater.”

“O....kay?”

“I retired last year.”

“I see...” the man blinks.

“Did you ever compete?”

He nods. “For a little while. I made it to the Grand Prix series once about three years ago.”

Viktor crosses his arms over his chest and hums. His seatmate slowly peels himself from the window, then slips a smartphone from his pant pocket. He taps at it gently before removing the left ear bud.

“If you were an international competitor, maybe we’ve met before,” Viktor says. “ _Have_ we met?”

The man shakes his head as he winds his earbuds around his phone and places it on top of the memo pad. “I don’t think so.”

“Viktor Nikiforov.”

He waits for the inevitable _Oh, yes! It’s you! Wow!_ The longer hair sometimes throws people off, but once they realize it’s him, the reaction is always the same.

“Huh?”

“My name. I’m Viktor Nikiforov.”

“Oh.”

It’s such a lackluster response, and it takes Viktor aback completely. _Every_ skater and skating fan knows who Viktor Nikiforov is. Usually, they’d be chattering and falling all over themselves by now. But this man just sits there with a level gaze. The seeds of Viktor’s more dramatic tendencies germinate and sprout.

“You don’t recognize me? My _name?_ Not at _all?_ ” Viktor interrogates, scandalized. He presses a hand to his own chest.

“S-sorry? Should I?”

The tension deflates from his chest entirely. “It’s been a long time since I’ve felt so wounded,” Viktor sighs.

“I’m sorry!” the man panics. “I didn’t mean to—”

A chuckle bubbles up from Viktor. This man is interesting. Honest. Sincere. A little slow. “What’s your name?”

“Yuuri.”

“Just ‘Yuuri’? No last name? How mysterious.”

“Katsuki,” the other man says with a small smile. “Yuuri Katsuki.”

“Japanese?”

Yuuri nods.

The bus pulls up to its next stop. Sleeping Man and Sleeping Man’s Wife stand and move to the front to pay their fare, after which the driver sits idle to give riders a chance to board. A middle-aged man in an ill-fitting suit climbs up and slips into a vacant seat directly across from Tired Mother and Hungry Daughter.

“And what are you doing in Saint Petersburg, Yuuri Katsuki?” Viktor muses, nestling back into his seat.

“How do you know I don’t live here?” Yuuri asks.

“You have entirely too many clothes on. I know it’s Russia, but it’s summer. And the maps,” Viktor says, pointing to a stack of pamphlets shoved between the Japanese man’s thigh and the seat, “give you away.”

“Oh. Yeah. Um... actually,” Yuuri says, fidgeting with his pen, “I was asked to coach another skater through the upcoming season, so I’m here with him. He’s enrolled in a special summer training camp with a Russian coach.”

“Yakov Feltsman’s camp?”

“That’s right,” Yuuri says. “Do you know him?”

Yuuri Katsuki’s cluelessness is unintentionally funny. And charming. Viktor’s mouth slips into an easy grin. “Yes, I know him. But the camp starts today, right? This bus is going in the wrong direction, you know.”

“He told me I didn’t have to come to his sessions. At least, not yet.”

“If you aren’t going to his sessions, then why are you here?” Viktor asks.

Yuuri uses the back end of his pen to scratch the top of his head. “He was really nervous about traveling on his own, so I guess for moral support? And if I can, I’d like to sit in at some point just to observe since I’ve never coached anyone before. But I haven’t actually met with Mr. Feltsman about that yet. Or at all, actually. I was just going to maybe… show up at some point and hope for the best, I guess.”

The bus is in motion again.

“Is that program for him? Your skater?” Viktor tips his head to indicate the memo Yuuri had been tapping earlier.

“Ah, yeah,” Yuuri replies, shifting his phone out of the way to scan his own notes. “But it might be a little hard for Minami-kun. His steps and expressionism are great, but his jumps are still a little shaky. Reminds me of myself, actually. He’s desperate to include quads this season, but....” He trails off, presumably to finish his thought privately. Muttering to himself in Japanese, he pens another series of boxy pictographs on the right margin of the page, then scratches them out and writes different ones above it.

The name he’d mentioned, the name of his pupil, causes something to fire in the back of Viktor’s mind. It sounds familiar, but he can’t picture a face. Maybe he’d heard it before in passing. Maybe he’s an up-and-comer or a rival of Yuri’s. It doesn’t much matter, either way. Viktor is much more interested in the skater right beside him.

“So, where are you going today?” Viktor asks with an amused smile. “Playing tourist?”

“Sort of. I’m going to Tah-vre...vri? Tahvresh-shkysad?” Yuuri’s forehead creases as he stumbles over the unfamiliar syllables.

This man’s sorry attempt at the Russian name has Viktor’s smile cracking at the corners and widening until it’s a big, round jovial opening that takes up half his face. Yuuri Katsuki is delightful. He doesn’t have any idea who Viktor Nikiforov is. He’s easy to talk to. He’s unpretentious and attractive, and Viktor is quite possibly bewitched already.

“Tauride,” Viktor says using the English-friendly name. “And that’s a coincidence, because I’m heading there myself. But honestly, I’m a little surprised. I didn’t know it was a popular spot for visitors.”

Yuuri smiles. It's shy, a bit awkward, but utterly appealing. “I don’t know if it’s popular, but I seem to remember it somehow, or... maybe someone told me about it once? When I found out we were coming to Saint Petersburg, the name just popped into my head, so I figured I should check it out.”

“You’ve never been there before?”

Yuuri shakes his head. “Never. This is my first time in Saint Petersburg. I don’t even really know what kind of place Tihvrrrsk....”

“Tauride.”

“Ah, right. Tauride. I don’t know what kind of place it is.”

An opportunity presents itself. As a skater, Viktor had been opportunistic, and it had never turned out poorly for him. In fact, it’s how he had managed to accrue his wealth. So of course, he takes this one as well.

“Shall we go together, then? I could show you around. Well, actually, I’ve never been there before either, but at least I could translate for you.”

It’s rare for Viktor to offer something like this to a stranger. His world is insulated, comprised mostly of the members of Team Russia, both past and present. The skaters he competed with have aged alongside him and with a few exceptions, many of them have either already retired or are on the verge. With Viktor spending most of his time taking over training duties from Yakov, he doesn’t travel quite as much as he used to and the chances to meet them have decreased dramatically. So he lives his life shuffling to and from the rink, rarely interacting outside of that familiar bubble. When fans recognize him on the street, he’s polite and charming of course. That’s what they expect, and even now, he has a persona to protect. But he’s always brief because Viktor is simply _no good_ with strangers— a little-known fact he worked hard to cover up when he was still on the international circuit.

And yet, that doesn’t seem to be the case at the moment, because being next to Yuuri Katsuki feels natural, and he wants to explore this unprecedented ease.

Yuuri’s eyes light up and his shoulders relax. “ _Really?_ Would that be okay?” he asks as the bus makes another stop to let Laughing Teen One and Laughing Teen Two off in front of an apartment building. “That’d be great. My Russian is terrible, obviously. I get horrible anxiety sometimes, and I’m actually a little nervous about getting around on my own. It took me an hour just to figure out which bus to take. You’d be doing me a big favor.”

“I’ve never met an anxious person who was so forthcoming with a stranger about being anxious,” Viktor teases as the bus lurches forward once more.

“Well, it’s not like I have anything to lose by being upfront about it. They say honesty is always the best policy, right?” Yuuri grins, and it’s pure radiance.

“I suppose they do,” Viktor agrees. “Then it’s decided.” He unfolds his arms and offers his right hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Yuuri Katsuki.”

Delicate fingers slip past Viktor’s palm. They’re warm and thin, and they fit into his clasp perfectly.

“You too, Viktor. I’ll be in your care.”

* * *

 

**Case No. STPBRG-NIKVI201X0331**

 

**[TRANSCRIPT]**

**PAGE: 1 of 57**

**ATTENDING: Minkovski, Oleg N.**

**TOTAL DURATION: 03:13:56**

 

_[click]_

 

Come in.

 

_[door]_

 

_[shuffle]_

 

Good morning. Please, have a seat.

 

_[scrape]_

 

_[cough]_

 

Now, then. I’ve had a chance to look over your file and everything seems to be in order, so we’ll go ahead and begin with the first step of the procedure if you’re ready to proceed.

 

>> _Okay._

 

This a digital recorder. We are going to have a little chat about the reason you’ve come to us today. Some of this might be a little repetitive and even a bit painful, but please try to answer all of my questions as fully and honestly as possible. Do you understand?

 

_> >Is this necessary? I’ve already filled out the personal history worksheets and signed all the forms._

 

The nature of our work changes _your_ reality, but not reality as a whole. The forms are an administrative necessity, but papers can be faked. Thus, in this line of business, we think it’s important to have a kind of secondary documentation that would be harder to falsify. An audio recording eliminates doubt.

 

_> >But why leave a record at all? Doesn’t that defeat the whole point?_

 

There are many reasons, all hypothetical, of course. If there was an egregious crime committed, for example, and law enforcement needed certain information that you were privy to prior to the procedure, we might be obligated to provide that.

 

_[...]_

 

I’ll be honest... the corporation has never actually needed to release anyone’s audio before. But we operate our franchise in a legal gray area, so from a business standpoint, it’s better to be safe than sorry. Think of it like backing up a hard drive. It’s just a precaution, hopefully never needed, but can make an unfortunate situation better.

 

_> >I’m sure you’ll understand if that doesn’t sit very well with me. Due to my... circumstances, that is. If this ever became public..._

 

Certainly. A man of your celebrity does indeed have to consider those sorts of things. But I assure you, you are not the first public figure we’ve worked with and all protective measures will be taken to keep your data safe, so you don’t have to worry yourself about this. These recordings are kept in a secure digital archive on a private server. It’s practically a fortress.

 

_[...]_

 

Now, if you’re ready, sir, could you please start by stating your name and the reason you’re seeking our services?

 

_[...]_

 

If you’re not comfortable with our policies, we can stop here. You came here of your own volition, and you’re free to leave at any time. Would you like to cancel the procedure?

 

_> >...No. No, I need to do this. I can’t go on like this anymore._

 

Then, your first and last name and the reason why you’re here, if you wouldn’t mind.

 

_> >My name is Viktor Nikiforov. I’m here to erase him._

 

I’m sorry. Of course I’ve read your written history, so I understand what you mean, but you’ll have to be more specific for the sake of the recording. Who are you referring to exactly? Who are you here to erase?

 

_[...]_

 

_> >My fiance. Ex-fiance._

 

I’ll need you to say his name, sir.

 

_> >Yuuri Katsuki._

 

Very good, Mr. Nikiforov, thank you. Let’s continue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm **really** excited to share this fic. I started writing this just as my first fic, [Dissonance](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10777674/chapters/23905305), was wrapping up. It's been banging around in my head for a while, and thinking about it keeps me up at night a lot. I hope you'll enjoy coming along for the ride, and I'm (not) sorry if it keeps you up, too. As of the day this first chapter was posted, I have already completed five of the nine planned chapters, so you can expect consistent updates! 
> 
> I love any and all comments and feedback either here or if you come say hi to me over on tumblr [@hanarezu-ni](https://hanarezu-ni.tumblr.com/). (I post and reblog a lot of YOI content, including updates and behind-the-scenes stuff for my fics.) 
> 
> If you want an unofficial playlist for some of the mood music I listen to when I work on this story, you can find a brief list [here](https://hanarezu-ni.tumblr.com/post/163051402744/unofficial-viktuuri-memory-loss-au-playlist).


	2. Facta Non Verba

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Actions over words_

Yuuri walks slowly through the apartment, running his fingertips over each surface as he goes along. They way he scrutinizes even the most minor details— book titles, small ovular frames with yellowed photos of generations past, a wind-up music box with a twirling skater inside— gives Viktor the distinct impression of living in a museum.

Viktor isn’t so different, though. He watches Yuuri move around as if he were a work of art come to life. How he had missed Yuuri’s constant presence. Sending him back to Japan had been hard, even if it had been for only a short while. At night, his bed had seemed to grow in size, leaving Viktor to feel like a small boat lost in a sea of sheets. They’d called each other nearly every day and texted twice as often. They’d celebrated Yuuri’s gold medal at Nationals via video chat, and on occasion, they’d even seduced each other with their voices alone over phone running hot with battery death. But it’d never been quite enough; when the line had gone dead after a sleepy good night or a text had gone unanswered for hours, Viktor would feel Yuuri’s absence heavily.

“ _Yuuri,”_ Viktor whines from the couch, where he’d curled up against an armrest with his dog. “You’re looking too much. It’s kind of embarrassing.”

“I can’t help it,” Yuuri says, standing near the bookshelves as he thumbs through the glossy pages of an old coffee table book that feature various stylized photos of poodles. “I’ve only ever seen this place in magazines. It’s so unreal to actually _be_ here.”

“Well? What do you think? Do you think you could consider this place your home eventually?”

Yuuri turns toward him with an affectionate smile. Shelving the book in its spot between a human anatomy text and an English dictionary, he crosses the room and grips the back of the couch. His trim waist bends, bringing him to hover over Viktor while simultaneously angling Viktor’s face upward with just two fingers under his chin. Viktor catches Yuuri’s eyes with his own; they are deep and warm, and Viktor knows the answer to his question already, before Yuuri speaks even a single word.

“If you’re here, then it’s _already_ home,” Yuuri says sweetly before closing the distance between their lips.

Viktor sighs into the kiss, moving his lips slowly along Yuuri’s. His eyes slip shut as Yuuri, with a hint of neediness, bends lower over to push him back into the armrest with his mouth. It hadn’t even been a month since they’d parted ways— Yuuri off to Japan to participate in the Japanese Nationals and then pack up both his and Viktor’s things, and Viktor to his home rink with Yakov and the rest of the Russian team to start preparing for upcoming qualifiers (and to ready the apartment for Yuuri’s arrival). Still, to be kissed by Yuuri again, to be able to kiss him back, it’s like a dream. They’d kissed upon their reunion in the airport and in the hired car that drove them home. Viktor had peppered the other skater’s cheeks with innocent pecks in the elevator on the way to the apartment. He’d kissed Yuuri (much less innocently) just inside the door before they’d even taken their heavy coats and scarves off.

But kissing each other here, in the living room of the home they now share while Makkachin whines because no one is paying him any attention... it’s a kind of bliss Viktor had never imagined, the most recent entry on a long list of new experiences Yuuri has gifted him.

Viktor breaks their connection and, when Yuuri presses their foreheads together with a happy hum, brings his hand up to the younger man’s rosy cheek. “I’m so glad you’re here,” he breathes out.

Yuuri turns his face into Viktor’s palm and touches his lips to the golden band around his ring finger. “Me, too.”

They stay like that for some time, Viktor enjoying the way Yuuri’s face warms his hand until Yuuri’s mouth stretches into a sudden, gaping yawn.

“You’re tired,” Viktor says. “You traveled a long way.”

“Mm, maybe a _little_ tired,” Yuuri agrees as he straightens his back.

“You can lie down if you want,” Viktor offers.

“But I don’t want to sleep yet. It seems like a waste. I just got here.”

He removes his glasses and needles at the inside corner of one eye with his ring finger, attempting to dislodge a bit of the remaining evidence of just how poorly he’d slept on the plane. Makkachin, seeing an opportunity to be the center of attention again, stands on his hind legs to paw at Yuuri’s chest.

“You should rest while you can,” Viktor says. “We can’t afford to take too much time off. There’s just a little more than a month until Four Continents, and I expect you to land your quad flip more consistently by then.”

Yuuri sighs and reaches down to ruffle Makkachin behind the ears. “Makkaaaa,” he complains, “my coach is too strict, don’t you think?”

Makkachin woofs his response, prompting Yuuri to shoot a glance at Viktor that silently says _See? He thinks so, too._ Viktor calls the dog a traitor. Makkachin falls back onto Viktor’s chest and licks up the side of his owner’s face.

“All right,” Viktor announces as he pushes himself up to a stand (and sends the large poodle scrambling to the other side of the couch in the process). He rounds the sofa and, after seizing Yuuri’s hand, tugs the Japanese skater down the corridor toward the master bedroom. “Time for a shower, then bed.”

At the threshold of the room, Viktor bends down and sweeps Yuuri up, hooking one under arm under his knees and the other under his back.

“Viktor!” Yuuri shrieks gleefully, kicking his feet. “Put me down! Let go!”

“Not a chance,” Viktor grins as he steps inside the room. He closes the door with the toe of one socked foot, leaving Makkachin to curl up just outside.

* * *

 

Yuuri whispers Viktor’s name right into his ear and of course Viktor startles. The soapy glass he’d been scrubbing slips out of his hand and crashes back into the sink where the rest of their dishes from dinner waited to be washed clean.

“You _scared_ me,” Viktor pouts as he turns off the water and wipes his hands on a dish towel slung over his left shoulder. He turns to face Yuuri, who stands before him with his lips pursed together and his hands behind his back. “I thought you were in the bedroom unpacking your things finally.”

“Don’t say ‘ _finally’_ ,” Yuuri huffs, scrunching his nose.

“You’ve been putting it off.”

“We’ve been busy, so I just never got around to it.”

“It’s been almost _three weeks_ ,” Viktor points out with a smirk. He leans back against the edge of the sink and folds his arms over his chest.

Yuuri’s brown eyes drift to the side. “Fair enough,” he mutters.

“What’ve you got there?” Viktor asks, motioning to Yuuri’s hidden hands.

Yuuri’s whole face lights up like the sun. “I forgot all about this until I saw it in my suitcase just now. It’s a present from my family. My dad said you liked this brand when you two went drinking together, so he told me to pack this for you.”

He brings out a bottle from behind his back and holds it up for Viktor to see. “Rice wine from that tiny brewery in the mountains,” he says while Viktor inspects the gold label with its black calligraphy and castle imagery.

“Oh, _yes_ ,” Viktor smiles, clapping his hands together. “I _loved_ this one! Thank you, Yuuri’s dad!”

Viktor takes the bottle from Yuuri and runs his thumb over the drawing of the castle, warmth blooming in his chest. He loves Hasetsu, and he loves Yuuri’s family. It’s really no wonder Yuuri is such a miracle─ he came from a peaceful town full of lovely, generous people who hadn’t hesitated to make Viktor feel welcomed and included. Before he’d arrived in Japan to coach Yuuri, Viktor had been depressed. It wasn’t something he would ever admit to anyone out loud (even now), but he knew it was true. At that time, he’d felt like he was falling down into a dark, endless pit, and he’d resigned himself to that fate. But Yuuri had caught his hand mid-fall and, with the help of the Katsuki family and their friends, pulled him up and out.

In a sense, he owed his life and love not just to Yuuri, but to every single one of them.

“Should we have a taste?” Viktor asks, glancing up at his fiance.

“Mmm... Let’s save it for something special,” Yuuri suggests.

Viktor grabs Yuuri around the waist with his free hand and reels him in until they’re chest to chest. “ _This_ is special,” he purrs.

The lopsided grin Yuuri flashes is perfection. So is the way he pops himself up on the balls of his feet, throw his arms around Viktor’s neck and pecks the corner of his upturned lips. “You know what I mean.”

Viktor’s fingers frequently have minds of their own where Yuuri is concerned; they walked up his spine to the base of his neck, and then bury themselves in his hair to hold the shorter man in place and rectify his poor aim. Viktor lands his mouth squarely on Yuuri’s; the sound Yuuri makes in response is equal parts surprised and contended.

“How about this, then,” Viktor offers when they pull apart. “We’ll drink this on the evening of our wedding.”

“And when will that be?”

“Whenever you want, my love.”

Yuuri’s dreamy smile transforms; his brows knit together and his mouth slackens with apparent suspicion. “ _Really?”_ he asks.

Viktor nods. “Really. I’d marry you tonight if you wanted,” he says. “Though, I think the the registration offices are probably closed at the moment.”

“What about a medal? You said I had to win a gold first,” Yuuri reminds him.

“You won gold at Nationals,” Viktor counters as he twists in Yuuri’s arms to place the glass bottle next to the sink for the time being.

“That doesn’t count, does it?”

“I don’t see why not,” Viktor says, bringing his other arm around to clasp his hands behind Yuuri’s back. “How about it? We could elope.”

Yuuri studies Viktor’s face. He runs his eyes over each one of Viktor’s individual features like he’s looking for something or waiting for him to flinch, or maybe even laugh. Viktor gazes back, steady and just a little bit hopeful.

“No,” Yuuri concludes. “Not yet. I want to get married when everyone's there. Don’t you?”

Viktor has always been the king of dramatics, and he pours it on thick now. With his most pitiful sigh, he pulls Yuuri in close and tucks his head of dark tresses into his chest. “I just want to marry you. But if that’s what my Yuuri wants, then I _suppose_ I can wait.”

A wide smile spreads against his pectoral and hands find the broad planes of his back. “Thank you, Viktor,” the Japanese skater says, his voice muffled.

* * *

 

On the last day of the World Championships, Viktor watches Yuuri soar across the ice from the sidelines and holds his breath. As the piano reaches the height of its crescendo and the strings sing in harmony, Yuuri takes off. His speed gives him the height Yuuri has been chasing since the Grand Prix Final and he makes the four rotations of his flip look effortless. The landing is flawless.

Viktor is always proud of Yuuri, but watching him skate his way to the top of the Worlds podium after completing “Yuri On Ice” for the last time has him choking back tears. Later, when they tangle together under the covers of their hotel bed, Viktor lavishes Yuuri with praise between each exquisite push. “You were stunning. Breathtaking. Beautiful. You’re my gold.”

Yuuri burns red from his the tops of his ears to the base of his neck. He hides his face with his hands and bites back wanton gasps while arching under his coach. When they finish and kick off the sheets to cool their spent bodies, Yuuri curls into Viktor. “Next year, you’ll be on the ice with me,” he sighs dreamily.

“I’ll be on the _podium_ with you,” Viktor corrects, pinching Yuuri’s nose.

Yuuri frees his nose with a quick turn of the neck to bury his face into Viktor’s rib cage. “I love you,” he whispers into his skin. “So much.”

“Say it again.”

Yuuri says it in more ways than one, over and over again.

* * *

 

"Perfect,” Viktor commends himself before turning and calling for Yuuri to come have look at his handiwork.

Yuuri pads into their bedroom with Makkachin, who is strangely subdued, hoisted over his shoulder like an oversized baby. “Did you call me?” he asks, peering over voluminous brown fur.

Viktor frowns at the dog in his fiance’s arms. “Is he still not eating?”

Yuuri shakes his head. “We should take him to the vet, maybe."

Viktor nods slowly.

“Anyway, you called?” Yuuri coughs.

“Oh! Yes!” Viktor grins as he steps aside to reveal a long, steel hanger mounted to the wall above their bed. “Look, I bought this the other day for your medals!”

Five medals hang at alternating lengths side by side: two silvers from the Cup of China and the Grand Prix Final, and the three golds he’d won at Japanese Nationals, Four Continents, and Worlds.

“Viten’ka,” the younger man groans after burying his face into the muted poodle in his arms. “That’s so embarrassing!”

“It is _not,_ ” Viktor insists. “It’s amazing, and you should be proud of them. You are the most talented skater in the world, and I want you to look at them and remember that _you’re_ at the top of the skating world while _I’m_ on top of _you._ ”

“Viten’ka!” Yuuri scolds, high-pitched and scandalized. The evidence of a smile glitters in Yuuri’s eyes before they slide over to a similar mount on the opposite wall where Viktor’s medals fight for space. “I might be the best right now, but only until the season starts.”

“True,” Viktor says, pressing a thoughtful finger to his lips.

“Hey!”

“What? _You_ said it. I was just being agreeable.”

Yuuri laughs brightly, shaking his head. “You’re unbelievable. Come on, Makkachin. There’s not enough space in here for us _and_ Viktor’s big head.”

“Was that a taunt about my forehead?” Viktor gasps, a hand to his chest.

Without answering, Yuuri turns back and slips out of the room, dog in tow. His laughter echoes down the hall.

“It was, wasn’t it? So cruel! Yuuri? Yuuri! Wait, come back here! _Yuuuuuuri!_ ”

* * *

 

With a stack of mail in hand, Viktor trudges down the outer corridor toward his apartment door, haggard and bleary-eyed. His face is frozen from the frigid wind, and the cold is doing no favors for his ankle, which still throbs. The European Championship had always been one of his favorite competitions, but _this_ year had been such a miserable show. It was one thing that Viktor had twisted his ankle again and missed the podium in Moscow by tenths of a point. It’s another thing altogether knowing that Yuuri wouldn’t be there to comfort him afterward. Or scold him, as it were.

But it couldn’t be helped. Europeans and Four Continents are separated by only two days this year and since the latter is in Sapporo, Yuuri had flown out to Japan the day after Viktor left for Moscow so that he could visit his family beforehand. Viktor, having finally finished his competition, would fly out tomorrow to meet Yuuri in Sapporo.

Still, it's been nearly a week since he’s seen his fiance and as many days since he’s gotten a phone call or a text. But Yuuri hasn’t seen his family in almost a year, and Viktor tries to be understanding. Yuuri had missed them; it was to be expected that he be preoccupied with his visit. And anyway, they’ll see each other in less than twenty-four hours.

When he unlocks the door, he calls out the usual announcement of his return home in Japanese, a leftover habit Viktor had picked up in Hasestu. No one replies, of course. Yuuri is in Japan, and Makkachin has been gone for half a year already. He drops his keys in the tray next to a framed photo of Yuuri and himself attacking each other in the outdoor showers after a summer afternoon on the beach in Hasetsu.

After depositing his mail on the couch-side table, Viktor makes a beeline for the bedroom, flipping light switches as he goes along. It isn’t the first time he’s come back to an empty flat, but Viktor always hates how quiet and cold the apartment seemed when he’s alone. It’s like going back to the Time Before Yuuri. That’s why his first order of business is to drop his bags on the bed, peel off his clothes, and run the shower. Aside from washing the airport stench from his body, the confined space makes him feel less lonely, and the sound of water masks the unnatural silence.

Once he’s toweled off and dressed in his most comfortable set of loungewear, Viktor checks his phone, hoping for a message or a missed call from his fiance, be it a confirmation of his flight schedule or a consolation for his letdown at Europeans. (Surely he’d been following news and already knows what happened.) But there’s nothing, only the time and date pasted on top of a photo of Yuuri giving Makkachin a bubble bath early last spring after the poodle had rolled in an overflowing dumpster during a morning walk.

Phone in tow, Viktor walks back into the living room and turns the television on. He lets himself fall back heavily onto the couch with a sigh and flips through dozens of channels until he finds a sports news program. He’s just in time to hear a clean cut woman behind a desk announce that the segment after next will cover the continuing saga of Viktor Nikiforov’s struggling comeback season. (“But first, the breaking headlines of the hour.”)

It’s a given that they’ll talk about his failure to medal in Moscow of course. Every single competition he’s taken part in this season has been rife with speculation and opinion pieces about the slow death of Russia’s shining star. How the mighty has fallen, and so on, and so on.

While waiting for the segment to begin, he sets his phone down and begins sorting through the stack of envelopes on the side table: Bill. Bill. A letter from one of his sponsors. Junk. Junk. A notification that the fire alarms in his building were scheduled to be tested next Tuesday. A birth announcement from his cousin in Omsk.

As he pulls the final envelope from the pile and sets the rest aside, his ears catch Yuuri’s name. The mail can wait. Raising the volume, Viktor instinctively leans in to listen.

“─has withdrawn from the upcoming Four Continents Championship in Sapporo, Japan, the ISU announced just hours ago. Katsuki, who was set to defend his title after winning gold at last year’s competition, arrived in Japan last week, reportedly to visit family before the event, but anonymous sources from his hometown are now saying that he has decided to retire from men’s figure skating. There is no official word yet from either Mr. Katsuki or his coach, five-time World champion Viktor Nikiforov.”

As the woman unceremoniously moves on to the next headline, Viktor can only sit and stare blankly at the dull glow of the television. The lines and color of her face become mere pixels. Her voice disappears, and then his surroundings go with it. He can’t comprehend in the slightest what she’s just said. It was a joke. It has to be. Otherwise, his phone would be ringing and pinging non-stop. He glances over to the phone on the table and waits for the inevitable barrage. He gets only silence.

The next step is to try to call Yuuri, but it just rings and rings without ever cutting to voicemail. Plan B is to send a text. He taps a message into the keyboard using only his thumb.

_< < Yuuri, what’s happening? Are you OK? The news said you’ve withdrawn from 4CC and are thinking about retiring? That’s ridiculous, right? Where would they even get such an idea? Call me ASAP, I haven’t heard from you in a while. I love you, and I can’t wait to see you tomorrow. >>_

Staring down into the screen, he wills a reply to come. Again, he’s met with silence. Still hunched over his phone, Viktor’s eyes drift to the envelope still pinched between the fingers of his other hand. It’s a nondescript white envelope with a white printed label bearing his name and address. Postmarked in Fukuoka, Japan, no return address

Viktor checks the back, but no address or sender is indicated there either. He puts his phone down on the couch and carefully tears one of the envelope’s short ends open before shaking a single heavy-stock postcard out. It’s printed in English with bold, black ink.

 

** Lacuna, Inc. **

 

**Dear Mr. VIKTOR NIKIFOROV,**

 

**This message is to inform you that**

**YUURI KATSUKI**

**has erased you from his memory.**

**Please make no further attempts to contact**

**YUURI KATSUKI.**

 

Viktor scans the words again, but they seem to jumble into an incomprehensible mess. He can’t make sense of them, no matter how many times he reads the message. There is no explanation or website or phone number to call. Just an impersonal (and obviously automated) memo in cold, blocky letters on stark white card stock.

While his mind is struggling to process _anything_ , his phone finally pings. Relief floods his chest. Yuuri will apologize for not calling. He’ll reassure Viktor that this is some sick joke played out by a crazed fan, or that it’s Yura’s revenge, extreme as it may be, for last month when Viktor had relentlessly teased the teen about the way his sudden growth spurt had transformed his lithe frame into an awkward mess of too-long limbs. Yuuri will laugh and say Viktor deserved it.

If only. Viktor’s stomach drops when he unlocks the phone and opens the messaging app.

_< < This isn’t Yuuri’s phone anymore. Sorry, Viktor. -Minako >>_

Both the postcard and phone slip from Viktor’s hands and hit the wooden floor below.

Nervous energy surges through him like lightning. It’s like even his fingers and toes are buzzing with the need to move. He wants to scream and cry and try calling Yuuri again. He wants to go outside and feel the snap of cold air whip his face. Maybe that will wake him up from this nightmare. It _is_ just a nightmare, right? He wants to throw things and pet his dog and kiss his husband-to-be. He wants to disappear. Instead, he sits on the couch, bouncing his legs.

“A drink,” Viktor mutters to no one. “I need to calm down. I need a drink.”

It’s when he’s stumbling into the kitchen and heading toward the designated liquor cabinet that he sees it: another simple white postcard, stuck to the center of the fridge with a small, round magnet─ a note from Yuuri, scrawled in pencil.

_Please believe me when I tell you that I had to do this._

_Don’t come find me─ it won’t do any good. Be well, Viktor._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I live for Yuuri calling Viktor "Viten'ka." It's like my personal aesthetic.
> 
> I don't know what to write to you all here because I don't want to give anything away!!! But thank you so much for reading and for the handful of comments and kudos I got on the first chapter. I hope your interest is even more piqued with this update. At least it answered one of the biggest questions I've been asked so far: namely, who forgot who first. Next chapter. the story will start explaining some of the lead-up and fallout, and we're going to be jumping around the timeline a LOT more. 
> 
> I will warn you that this is probably the LEAST angsty chapter of the whole fic. There's some fluff and such littered throughout, but this chapter has the highest concentration of it. It's gonna get... hard... from here on out. 
> 
> Also, FYI: I actively chose not to factor any Olympic games into this fic even though they probably happened. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> Just some bits of related news: 
> 
> I started working on Chapter 7 of this fic this past week and it got super long super fast. Because the set-up of this fic is to give you snapshots of different points in the timeline, I purposely want to keep my chapters a little bit shorter than they've been in my other work. So I ended up adding two chapters, bringing the total planned total from eight to ten. Yay!
> 
> But also, I have had a BIG move and life change on my horizon for a while. It was supposed to happen earlier this summer, but got delayed, and now it looks like it's back on track. I don't know my exact timeline yet, but it seems like everything will start getting put into motion sometime next month and I'm not sure about my internet situation for a while once it does. So now I'm trying to figure out if I want to update twice a week starting in August so that it's mostly uploaded before the move, or if I want to just keep to my once-a-week schedule to draw it out as planned but maybe take a hiatus in the middle. So there's that. I'll have a better idea, I think, by next week, so I'll let you know then. (Feel free to tell me about your preference if you have one.) 
> 
> Come find me over on tumblr [@hanarezu-ni](http://www.hanarezu-ni.tumblr.com) for updates and a ton of YOI stuff.


	3. Cetera Desunt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _The rest is missing_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mild warning: there is a section in which two characters discuss the specifics of Makkachin's passing. Apologies in advance. Also, there is some intentional blank spacing done for emphasis about the nature of what comes before and after it. Just keep scrolling. 
> 
> News regarding the update schedule of this fic in the end notes.

The floor is littered with clothing: jeans, sweaters, underpants, socks. They sit in crumpled messes, the kind Viktor usually can’t stand, creased and wrinkled by the abandon with which they were tossed. The sheets on the bed are equally wrinkled and creased and the nightstand drawers are hanging open. An expensive bottle of Viktor’s favorite brand of vodka, its contents emptied, has rolled halfway under the bed. In the center of it all is Viktor, completely disrobed and skin prickling with the coolness of the morning air.

He groans as sunlight intrudes into the room and forces his eyes to squeeze shut in protest. Those groans only become louder as he rolls himself up into a sit. His back screams with stiffness and his head feels full of water sloshing about in a fishbowl. “Yuuri?” he calls out, voice dry and cracked.

All around is silence.

Viktor’s heart sinks; he thinks back to the night before and it’s all a blur. He can’t remember, he can’t remember, he can’t remember. Why is he on the floor? Why is he naked? Where is Yuuri? His head drops down into his heads and he scrubs at his hair in a vain effort to rattle some memory of how he got here.

A door clicks open; a soft voice says, “Hey.”

Silver locks fly as his head shoots up so fast that he feels instantly dizzy. Yuuri stands in the doorway of their room wrapped in a flannel robe, a tall glass of water clutched gingerly in one hand. He is equally disheveled─ his hair sticking up in every direction and his face a little pale, but his beaming smile radiates warmth.

“Yuuri,” Viktor says, dumbly.

“Here,” Yuuri says as he crosses the room and holds out the glass, “I thought you’d probably need this.”

Viktor blinks up at him, but takes the water and downs it in one go. It’s straddling the line between room temperature and cold, and it feels like heaven as it flows down his parched throat. Yuuri tugs a blanket off of their bed and drapes it over the other man’s shoulders before settling on the floor next to him.

“I think we overdid it last night,” he yawns, leaning his shoulder into Viktor’s.

“Overdid _what_? I can’t remember at all,” Viktor admits.

“Not surprising,” Yuuri half laughs, half sighs. “You kept going on and on about celebrating the anniversary of when you became my coach, and then you pulled out vodka, and then...” He gestures vaguely to the mess but doesn’t complete his sentence. He doesn’t have to; the rest is evident.

Tipping the glass back to get the last drops of water pooling at the bottom of the glass, Viktor tries to remember. When he concentrates, he can somewhat recall pressing his body against Yuuri’s while they laughed and danced in the living room, Yuuri’s lidded eyes hovering over his face, the carnal sounds that he pushed out of Yuuri, having bent him over the bed.

“Ah, that’s right, isn’t it?” he says with a wicked smile.

Yuuri shoves his shoulder playfully before having a look around the room. “Anyway, I want to clean up before Makkachin comes in here and chews everything. You should go take a shower. It’ll help with the hangover.”

“Where is he, anyway?” Viktor asks as Yuuri stands and starts to gather various garments. Morning has always been Makkachin’s favorite time of the day; usually, he’d be on top of one of them begging for food and a walk by now.

“Sleeping in the living room,” Yuuri says. “I fed him breakfast, but he curled up on the couch after he finished. He seemed sleepy still.”

Slowly, as not to provoke another round of dizziness, Viktor clutches the blanket around himself and pushes himself to a stand. “That makes two of us,” he complains.

“Go shower, Viten’ka,” Yuuri insists.

The pet name catches Viktor off guard. “What did you just say?”

The Japanese man blushes so beautifully as he clutches their clothing to his chest. “Vi...Viten’ka? Y-you told me to call you that. Last night,” he coughs. “But it sounds weird after all, doesn’t it? Sorry, I won’t--”

The smile that pulls at Viktor’s mouth so wide, it almost hurts. He takes Yuuri by the arm and pulls him into a loose embrace. “I _love it._ Never call me anything else.”

“...Okay,” Yuuri smiles bashfully, “Viten’ka.”

And then his face blurs and pixelates as if Viktor is viewing him through an old television screen. It distorts until his soft, round features become ugly and unrecognizable in their sharpness, and Viktor has to close his eyes because it’s too disturbing, too frightening, not Yuuri anymore.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Viktor’s eyes are wet when they fly open. He stares up at the ceiling and tries to focus them, but tears blur his vision no matter how many times he tries to blink them away.

A dream. Or not quite a dream.

A memory.

A beautiful memory he cherishes. Cherished? The tense matters. (Does it?)

The current state of the bedroom is an extreme version of how it had looked like back then. Nearly all of the dresser draws have been emptied and are still hanging open. Clothing has been tossed without regard to the floor, the bed, even the bedside table. The alarm clock (reading 03:32 AM) and lamp have been swept from their perches and sit topsy-turvy on the floor next to an empty bottle of whiskey. The overhead light is still on. Viktor is still dressed.

He groans as he rolls to his side and pushes himself up. The stiff back is the same, as is the fishbowl feeling in his head. He doesn’t call for Yuuri, though. There’s no point. Yuuri isn’t here. Won’t come. Viktor already knows.

In a rage urged on by the warm sting of alcohol, Viktor had swept the apartment for signs of his fiance. Yuuri’s books were still shelved. His laptop was still tucked away on the bottom shelf of the table next to Yuuri’s side of the bed, though the password had been changed and after thirty-four different guesses, Viktor had given up. Even his medals, now totaling eleven after taking gold in every event he’d participated in so far this year, hung in their usual spot above the bed.

But all of his clothing, including jackets and shoes, had disappeared from their drawers and hangers. Everything surrounding Viktor now is his own. The only other things missing are Yuuri’s toothbrush, his wallet, phone, charger, and all of his skating gear. If Viktor had only given the apartment a passing glance, everything would have seemed to be in its right place, more or less.

Still, Viktor had felt a twinge of hope. If Yuuri had wanted to leave for good, wouldn’t he have brought more with him? Taking just his clothes means he’d just needed some time away... more time than they’d planned obviously (and that still hurt), but not _forever_. His handwritten note hadn’t specifically mentioned _erasing_ Viktor, after all. Something must have happened to him over there. Something must have changed.

Sitting back against the bed, Viktor wipes the wet from his eyes and glances around for his phone. He finds it under a black dress sock. When he turns on the display, he tries his best to not see the picture he uses for his lock screen, or the one of Yuuri’s freshly showered face, all red and shiny, that acts as the background for the home screen. Instead, he taps on Instagram and searches for Yuuri’s username. The search returns no results. Twitter is next, then Facebook. Yuuri had never been one for social media, of course. He only updated once in a blue moon, and it was common for months to pass between posts. But he did _have_ them. Until now.

A Google search of his name brings up nothing but dead links to those same profiles and news articles from the past and present. The most recent pieces are all speculative editorials on the sudden nature of Yuuri’s withdrawal from Four Continents and the rumors of his retirement. There is no official statement still (but his inbox is flooded with requests for one from reporters and news outlets), and it seems that any attempts to contact Yuuri or his friends and family in Hasetsu have gone unanswered. Even a quick backtrack to check the social media profiles of anyone who might know something brings up no mention of him, not even from Phichit.

Searching is a fruitless exercise anyway. In truth, Viktor had done this right before he tore the apartment apart looking for clues. But he needs to confirm that this is really happening, that he hadn’t just dreamt it, that Yuuri has actually gone away, has actually decided to forget him.

He goes through the motions four more times before the sun comes up. He still doesn’t quite believe it.

* * *

 

“Vitya,” Yakov grumbles from the center of the rink, where Georgi is running through a choreographic sequence, “Get back out here this instant or so help me, I will have you doing spins until you vomit!”

“But Yakov,” Viktor whines from the other side of the half wall where he’s sidled up to Yuuri, one arm draped suggestively low over the small of his back. “We’re talking about his jump combination for his short program. I’m _coaching_ him right now!”

“You’ve been slacking off since Katsuki got here. What you’re doing isn’t _coaching,_ it’s _foreplay.”_

 _“_ Coach!” Yuuri blanches, his cheeks instantly apple red. Somewhere, Yuri snorts in an effort not to guffaw. Georgi exhales a jealous sigh as he passes behind Yakov with his leg pulled up and over his head in a slow spiral.

“You’re not any better, Katsuki,” Yakov barks. “You should be the one talking some sense into him since he never listens to _me_.”

“Y-yes, Coach,” Yuuri replies. He shoots Viktor an accusatory glare. “Look. You got me in trouble, too.”

“Sorry, my love. I’ll make it up to you later,” Viktor grins. “After your break, work on your sequence just before the flip-loop combo. You’ve got to get more speed to make both jumps, but every time you get faster, your steps suffer. They should be sharper.”

Yuuri nods. “I think so too.”

“Take some video so I can have a proper look later,” Viktor instructs as he slips off his skate guards. He presses a kiss to Yuuri’s nose (which elicits the most _wonderful_ giggle from the smaller man) and glides back onto the ice. “Okay, okay. I’m here. Now, what would you like me to do, _Coach_?” Viktor calls to sweetly.

Yakov folds his arms over his chest and fires off a bullet list of complaints about Viktor’s free skate. Viktor nods along but lets his mind wander to just how he’ll apologize for putting Yuuri in Yakov’s cross hairs. He has some ideas.

* * *

 

Everything feels like it's moving in slow motion. Morning practice had dragged on for centuries every day this week, and Viktor’s lack of motivation and energy had been visible to the point that Yakov finally ordered him off the ice.

“Go weight train or go for a run. Or go home, I don’t care. Just... get out of here. Come back when your head is cleared.”

Yakov’s tone always sounds harsh, but Viktor’s been with him long enough to read the sympathetic look in his eyes. Yakov understands. So he collects his gloves, jacket, and water bottle from the wall and decides to go home. As he rounds the corner into the locker room, he overhears Yuuri talking to Yuri. He stops just before entering and moves to the side, concealing himself behind the door frame to listen.

“So, what? He just _starved_ to death?” Yuri asks, bluntly.

“Something like that,” Yuuri sighs. “He started eating less and less, and when he _did_ eat, he’d have an accident almost immediately after, which was weird because he was house trained so well. It was like his stomach couldn’t digest anything. Everything just went right through him.”

“That sucks,” Yuri murmurs. It’s crass, but sympathetic─ something only the Russian teen can pull off.

“When we woke up on Saturday morning, he was already gone,” Yuuri chokes.

“Didn’t you take him to a vet?” Yuri asks.

“We did, two or three weeks ago. The doctor said it was something to do with his.... pancreas? They told us there wasn’t much we could do but try to manage it through his diet, but... but he rarely wanted to eat, and... he lost s-so much w-weight...”

Viktor hears a sob echo off the bare walls and metal lockers, and then, “S-Sorry, Yurio. Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Yuri says in barely a whisper. “Katsudon, shh. It’s okay. Animals are family. If my cat got sick...Shit. I’d be a fucking mess.”

“I’m upset,” Yuuri says between sobbing spasms, “but Viktor is a total wreck. He hasn’t really slept. It’s like living with a zombie. And when I try to comfort him, he just... shuts down. He won’t talk about it at all.”

“That explains why he’s been so sloppy on the ice this week,” Yuri scoffs. “I know he loved that dog, and as much as I hate to say it, I feel bad for him. But he’s gonna have to pull it together soon. This year’s Grand Prix assignments are supposed to come out tomorrow.”

“Yeah,” Yuuri says after a sharp, sobering inhale.

Viktor turns around and heads straight for the rink. As soon as his blades hit the ice, he launches into speed laps around the perimeter until the strain in his legs leaves his face red and sticky with sweat and his chest heaving. In his peripheral, he can see Yakov is watching, but the old man doesn’t say a word.

* * *

 

Viktor takes silver at Skate America. Both of his programs are well-received by an audience who seems ecstatic to have him back. They scream his name as the official slips the medal over his neck, and Viktor basks in the nostalgia of it. But what makes everything so much better is looking up at Yuuri, who is standing at the center and beaming back down at him with a smile as bright as the gold medal hanging in front of his chest. Yuuri had been magnificent, and Viktor can only feel pride in his fiance.

Viktor makes a mental note to thank Yuuri for pushing him to come back to the ice─ he’d been right. Viktor wouldn’t have wanted to miss this moment.

At the press conference, the gathered sports journalists spend an inordinate amount of time asking him questions, despite his instance that they lavish praise on his fiance for his stunning performance.

“Viktor, how do you feel about only taking silver in the first Grand Prix event of your comeback season?” a woman with fiery red hair cut into an asymmetric bob asks.

“You say it like it’s a bad thing,” Viktor chuckles. “As you all know, in this sport I’m considered a grandfather.” The crowd laughs. “And you may have heard that I suffered a personal loss at the start of summer. Those factors and the reality of having taken a season off mean that I’ve had to work harder, maybe even more so than I did when I was just starting out as a junior. But I’m thinking about this weekend’s performances as warm-up mode. I’ll only get better from here on.”

“The music for both of your programs is rather emotional, I thought,” an older woman notes. “What can you tell us about your theme or your state of mind for this season?”

Viktor smiles. “My theme for this season is ‘ _Remember,_ and it _is_ rather emotional for me, but I won’t say more than that. It’s quite personal.”

What Viktor doesn’t tell them is that his theme for this year is a tribute to rediscovering his imagination and passion for the sport, an unspoken bit of gratitude to the man who had reignited him (as well as a playful jab at his decided _lack_ of recollection of their dance in Sochi), and a still-grieving nod to the loss of Makkachin. He feels all of these things so deeply, to the core of his bones, and he’d chosen music that had shaken him in a similar fashion.

“How does it feel to come in second to your own student? Does this mean the student has become the master?” an older, heavy-set man in round wire-framed glasses asks from the back of the room. Another round of laughter follows.

“It feels amazing,” Viktor says. “Yuuri was exceptional and he deserved to win gold. I’m so, _so_ proud of him.” He takes the opportunity to flash Yuuri a winning smile. Yuuri smiles back shyly. “But I don’t intend to go easy on him. Competing against him is my biggest source of motivation this season, and I’ll be giving him a run for his money at this year’s Final.”

“Even though his total today put him at a nine-point lead over you?” a former skater-turned-commentator that Viktor vaguely remembers asks flatly. “It’s a little early to be talking about the Final, don’t you think?”

The room goes quiet with only a stray whisper or murmur from the fringe of the crowd. Viktor’s mouth twitches downward.

“I...I only skated so well because of Viktor’s coaching,” Yuuri cuts in quickly. “And there’s still so much I can learn from him. Viktor will definitely take gold in China, and I can’t wait to face him in the Final.”

Viktor smiles softly at the Japanese man next to him. Under the table, he find’s Yuuri’s right hand and runs his thumb over the ring encircling his finger. Yuuri catches his hand and squeezes back.

A tall man with dark hair and a broad nose clears his throat and turns a question toward the bronze medalist, Leo de la Iglesia, who gushes about the honor of standing on a podium with two of his idols.

* * *

 

“If it’s nine in the morning _here,_ then it’s...” Viktor counts six hours on his fingers, eyes still bleary and head still pounding, “three in the afternoon there.”

That’s perfect, actually. Everyone will be preparing for the dinner rush, so surely someone will be around to answer the phone.

Viktor settles back on the couch and stares at his phone, where the Skype app is open and the correct phone number is already punched in, waiting. His chest knots at the thought of hitting the call button. It’s been months and months since he lived in Japan, and while he’d made due between their shaky grasp of English and his terrible understanding of Japanese, the phone was a different matter altogether.

Still, he has to try.

He sends the call through and puts the phone on speaker while it rings.

“Hello, thank you for calling Yuutopia,” a woman’s voice answers in stiff Japanese. “How can I help you?”

“Mari?” Viktor asks.

“...Viktor.” Her voice is unsurprised, as if she’s been both expecting and dreading his call.

“I want to talk to Yuuri,” Viktor says slowly in her native tongue.

“You got the card?” Mari asks in English.

“Yes,” Viktor replies.

“Then you know. It’s impossible,” Mari says simply.

“Just let me talk to him. Please.”

“No.”

In the background, Viktor hears a man’s voice, muffled by distance from the phone, ask, “ _Mari-neechan?”_ His chest feels like it may implode or explode, he can’t be sure. He takes the phone off speaker mode and presses it hard to his ear, straining to hear even another word from Yuuri.

“Let me talk to him!” Viktor shouts into the receiver.

“No!” Mari fires back before slipping back into whispered Japanese. “He doesn’t remember you. He decided this, and it’s too late now.”

“Mari, please...”

“It’s finished. Don’t call here anymore.” Her English is terse and practiced, like she’d rehearsed just the right thing to say for this very situation.

“Mari! Don’t--”

The line goes dead. In a fit of rage, Viktor sends his phone sailing across the room with such a force that the screen cracks when it catches the edge of the entertainment center.

* * *

  

It takes three days after his brief conversation with Yuuri’s sister before Viktor is able to drag himself out of the apartment. When he finally returns to the rink, he does so with no skating bag in hand─ just a white piece of cardstock that has been crumpled and warped by anger and tears. He pushes through the double doors that lead out to the ice, marches in and yells for Yakov, who is talking with Milla about trying to incorporate a tano with one of her jumps in the second-half of her program. Everyone freezes when they hear Viktor, eyes wide with anticipation.

Yakov stares at Viktor for a long while before the tension in his shoulders goes slack with a labored sigh.

“Everyone off the ice,” he orders gruffly. “We need to have a meeting. And bring your postcards."

* * *

 

“ _Everyone_ knew, Chris,” Viktor says into his phone. He tilts his head back against the headboard of his bed and covers his eyes with the back of his arm. “They all got postcards too, asking them not to mention me to Yuuri ever again and to avoid bringing Yuuri up in conversation with me.”

Chris is one of those people who never shuts up on the phone, but he’s oddly silent now.

“...you got one too,” Viktor concludes.

“Sorry, _chéri._ I’ve heard about this sort of thing, but I... never really put much stock in it. So when I got the postcard, I didn’t know what to do... if I should call you about it or not. It _does_ say to avoid mentioning it at all.”

“I thought it was an urban legend,” Viktor says. “Is this kind of thing even _possible?_ What does it even _mean_ , he _erased_ me from his memory?”

“I don’t know,” Chris admits. “Like I said, I’ve only heard vague things. But this company... Lacuna, is it? It seems to be an international chain.”

“How do you know _that?_ ”

”Google.”

Viktor removes his arm and looks up at the ceiling. In his desperation, he’d never thought to simply search for the company’s name. “Do you think that means _all_ the other skaters got one as well? A postcard, I mean,” he asks.

“I don’t know about _all._ Anyone who ever interacted with the two of you at the same time, maybe. I suspect Phichit received one, though. Or maybe he knew in advance? He sent me a strange message out of the blue a while back, asking me if I knew anything about how to block webpages with certain keywords. We chatted about that briefly, and I haven’t heard from him since.”

Viktor’s stomach drops. “Chris,” he starts with a light quiver, “When did you get your postcard?”

“Ah, well, I saw it when I got back from the European Championships, same as you. But if you want to know when it was postmarked, you just have to check the envelope. I’d go look for you, but I’m afraid I already tossed mine.”

Viktor curses to himself for overlooking such a minute detail and vows to do so as soon as he and Chris have finished talking. For now, he settles for a long sigh as a reply.

When he hangs up forty minutes later after a conversation which leaves him puffy-eyed and feeling more broken than ever, he gets up to search for the envelope. It takes half an hour to track it down and ends up being under the couch where he’d dropped it the night before last.

Any hope Viktor had that Yuuri hadn’t pre-planned this is all at once dashed as soon as his eyes find the Fukuoka postmark. The date under it is the day after Yuuri had arrived in Japan. Erasing Viktor must have been his first order of business. Yuuri had sent Viktor off to Moscow with a kiss at the airport and then had flown to Japan the next day _knowing_ he wouldn’t be coming back.

Viktor runs to the bathroom and vomits into the open toilet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry about Makkachin. It was sort of rough for me too because I used to have a poodle mix and this is exactly what happened to her. Apparently, it's pretty common for the breed. :(
> 
> I want to thank a few of you who I know have recommended or reblogged recommendations for the fic over on tumblr. So far, this story hasn't quite taken off the way Dissonance did, and that's fine. This is a pretty heavy fic and I know it's not for everyone. But I always appreciate when people take the time to let others know about my writing. I love youuuuuuuu~~ 
> 
> **IMPORTANT NEWS**  
>  At the end of August, I will be making a huge, long, complicated move due to work, and details about where exactly I will be living are still up in the air. As such, my internet situation may be a little spotty and even if it isn't, things are going to be stupid hectic for me for a while. Since I have already written this fic to near completion (I'm starting the final chapter this weekend), I've decided to update twice a week instead of just once. If I do this, the entire fic will be uploaded before I move. Since YFbVF is really snapshot-y and uses short chapters that jump around a timeline, I think going on hiatuses of uncertain lengths would make reading it sort of confusing, so I think this is best for the reader experience. And that's why you got a chapter today instead of Sunday! Look out for Chapter 4 in on Tuesday or so! 
> 
> In the meantime, come find me over on tumblr [@hanarezu-ni](http://www.hanarezu-ni.tumblr.com) for YOI goodness.


	4. Mutatis Mutandis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Changed what had to be changed_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some colorful language ahead.

**Case No. STPBRG-NIKVI201X0331**

 

**[TRANSCRIPT]**

**PAGE: 56 of 57**

**ATTENDING: Minkovski, Oleg N.**

**TOTAL DURATION: 03:13:56**

 

I think that will about cover all of the questions I have for you regarding your relationship with Yuuri. I know you were already given the information packet that outlines everything, but I’d like to talk with you a little bit about the banking procedure we’ll conduct tomorrow morning.

 

_> >Okay._

 

After you leave here today, I will need you to go home and gather anything that belonged to Yuuri, or anything that you associate with him. It can be letters, photos, objects you purchased together... anything at all that might remind you of him or your life together. When you come back tomorrow, please bring these items with you. They will help us create a map of your memories so that we can effectively target and eliminate them during the final erasure. Once we’ve finished the banking procedure, we will dispose of these items for you.

 

_> >How do you do that? Creating a map, I mean._

 

It’s something like an MRI. We will monitor your brain activity while you view the items, and that will tell us where those particular memories are located. From there, we create a data list so that during the final erasure procedure, we can quickly destroy each memory one by one in a speedy, painless manner.

 

_> >So it’s brain damage._

 

In a manner of speaking, yes. But I assure you, it’s completely safe and painless.

 

_[...]_

 

Mr. Nikiforov?

 

_> >No, it’s... I was just thinking. Sorry. Can I ask you a question?_

 

Of course.

 

_> >Can you only get rid of memories of people, or can you delete times and places, too? For example, if I competed in an event with Yuuri, will I forget the event completely, or will I just forget that Yuuri was there?_

 

As long as we can create a detailed enough map of associated memories, we can strike down a complete scene if the patient requests us to go that deep, or erase years even, but it requires a lot of careful thought and preparation. In general, it’s like natural memory loss. The space that person occupied will just be empty. It’s like when you vaguely recall a former schoolmate, but can’t picture his face or name. He just becomes a faceless body without an identity.

 

_> >I see._

 

I will say, however, that if there is a location-specific memory that involves only the two of you, like a vacation you took together for example, your brain may naturally forget the time and place, as it has no other significance to you. And even in the case where other people were present, the brain has a way of naturally dulling the surrounding circumstances as well. Does that answer your question?

 

_> >Yes, thank you._

 

Is there a place or event or time frame you want to forget, specifically? Now would be the time to say so.

 

_> >N....no. I thought... well, I’d considered maybe forgetting the entire last year or two, but I don’t want to forget my dog, and waking up two years in the future seems frightening. Also, if I remember this last season, it makes my decision to retire less confusing, I think. If some of that will naturally fade on its own, I think that will be sufficient._

 

Wonderful. Now, on to my next concern. Because you _do_ have a significant presence in the world, you need to be extra aware of things like social media and news stories. We can erase your memories, and we will, of course, send the proper notification to the individuals you’ve listed on your forms, but we cannot do anything about the media and the internet can make avoidance difficult. It’s not likely that viewing casual references to Mr. Katsuki will cause you any problems, but if someone were to show you an old news clipping of the two of you or ask you about him in an interview... well, it would be very confusing.

 

_> >...Could my memories come back?_

 

No, there’s no evidence for that. But it might cause you a considerable amount of distress to realize there’s a whole part of your life that you don’t remember. Knowing that you don’t know something can be a painful thing.

 

_> >...Oh. Well...I’ve already spoken with my coach about this. I withdrew from the World Championship and now that the season is over, he has made an official statement to the media on my behalf about my retirement and my split with Yuuri. He asked that no one mention Yuuri to me, as it’s a sensitive and personal subject that I am not ready to discuss. I won’t be taking any interviews for a long while. My rinkmates are already aware of the situation and have agreed to comply with the same request._

 

Very good. And what about past news stories and the like? Social media?

 

_> >I’ll be bringing my computer and phone with me tomorrow after I remove some important files... Nothing about Yuuri! You know, just financial documents and such._

 

Of course.

 

_> >So you can just toss those with everything else. I’ve already ordered new ones. They’ll be sent to my coach, and one of my rinkmates is going to keyword-block Yuuri’s name for me. As for social media, I’ve already deleted my accounts. I won’t be setting up new ones._

 

\------

 

**Case No. STPBRG-NIKVI201X0331**

 

**[TRANSCRIPT]**

**PAGE: 57 of 57**

**ATTENDING: Minkovski, Oleg N.**

**TOTAL DURATION: 03:13:56**

 

It seems you’ve thought this through quite thoroughly, and I’m glad you have an understanding support network. That will make everything much easier. Then, on to the matters of the final procedure. Generally, erasure occurs in the evening while you sleep. This ensures that we have enough time to complete our work, but we also find that it’s less confusing for patients to wake up in the morning as usual. It’ll just feel like you woke up from a heavy, dreamless sleep.

 

_> >Will I remember the procedure?_

 

No. Remembering the procedure would defeat the point of the procedure, would it not? In any case, all the materials and instructions will be sent to your house on the day of. We ask that you go to bed around nine in the evening and please wear the clothing we will provide you.

 

_> >When will that be? The night of the... erasure, I mean._

 

Typically, we prefer to schedule the final procedure on the evening of the day you have the banking procedure done which, as I noted earlier, is tomorrow in your case. This gives patients minimal time to second-guess their decision. Of course, we will accommodate your schedule if tomorrow evening is not good for you.

 

_[laugh]_

 

Does tomorrow not work?

 

_> >No._

 

_[laugh]_

 

_> >I mean yes. Sorry. Sorry. Tomorrow is good. Kind of perfect, actually. Very fitting._

 

Oh? How do you mean, Mr. Nikiforov?

 

_[...]_

 

_> >Tomorrow is the day we were supposed to get married._

 

I see.

 

_[...]_

 

Mr. Nikiforov? Are you alright?

 

_[sob]_

 

Mr. Nikiforov...

 

_[click]_

 

*****END TRANSCRIPT*****

* * *

 

Viktor doubles over and puts his hands on his knees while he tries to steady his breathing. Breathing is difficult when every inhale sends a deep burn spreading through his chest, but he focuses on each inhale and exhale in an attempt to bring both under control. Below his skates, the ice ripples. Viktor squeezes his eyes shut and tries to will the sensation to subside. It’d be easier to do if Yakov weren’t bellowing a string of criticisms laced with expletives into his ear from behind the boards.

“Are you even listening to me, Vitya?” the old man seethes at his side, then scoffs at his own question. “Of course you aren’t!”

“I’m listening,” Viktor coughs, angling his head to the side to glance at his coach through a curtain of hair that’s been pasted to his forehead. “But this is the tenth time we’ve run through this program.”

“And you _still_ haven’t done it even remotely well,” Yakov spits. “Surely you’re not going to tell me this is still about the dog. It’s already been two months!”

Viktor’s stomach bottoms out, but he fights the urge to flinch. One month or two, Makkachin’s absence still feels fresh every day, because Viktor hasn’t yet kicked the habit of calling for the poodle when he returns home. But now is not the time to say so; Yakov had been sympathetic, but his sympathy has its limits, and Viktor knows Yakov passed them long ago.

“No,” he swallows. “I’m just tired.”

“Your stamina is pathetic,” Yakov complains. “This is what you get for taking a season off at your age, you know. I told you this is what would happen.”

It’s still a struggle to stand upright without feeling like he’s going to tip to one side, but it’ll be more of a struggle to assert himself in front of Yakov when he looks like he’s cowering under the old geezer. He uprights himself slowly and pushes his hair back; sweat glues it in place off of his forehead.

“In my own defense, I spent all morning running through Yuuri’s free program with him,” Viktor points out.

“I told you that trying to compete and coach at the same time was insane, but you insisted. You fucking around with Katsuki isn’t my problem,” his coach spits; the double meaning isn’t lost on the skater. “But you not being able to manage a fucking triple axel right after your layback in the second half _is.”_

The bulging vein that snakes up Yakov’s temple and disappears under his hat throbs in time with the emphasis and Viktor isn’t quick enough to completely contain the amusement that makes itself apparent on his lips. He knows he’s made a grave mistake though because Yakov sees Viktor’s smirk as evidence that he’s _still_ not listening and needs to be reprimanded that much more.

“You’ve been assigned to Skate America first, and you know what a fucking shit show it is _every year_ , Vitya. Media everywhere like it’s the goddamned circus, and with you skating the first Grand Prix event of your comeback, it’ll be ten times more... _more._ This might have been good enough for qualifiers, but skating as you are right now isn’t going to cut it. Are you _trying_ to make a fool of yourself?”

Viktor waves a hand dismissively and pushes off into a glide toward the opening in the half wall on the other side of the rink. “You worry too much, Yakov. Anyway, I always manage somehow, don’t I?”

“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” Yakov rages.

“Home,” Viktor calls over his shoulder. “I promised Yuuri I’d help him with--”

“Viten’ka.”

Eyes forward, Viktor sees Yuuri standing to the side of the small door that leads on and off the ice, one hand on the wall and the other gripping the straps of the skating bag slung over his left shoulder. His fatigue seems to evaporate in an instant.

“Yuuri! I thought you went home already,” Viktor says, an easy smile slipping into place as he comes to a stop on the other side of the wall and places a hand over his fiance’s.

“I... was waiting for you,” Yuuri says, one corner of his mouth cocked apologetically.

“Vitya!” Yakov bellows from the other side of the ice. “We aren’t done here!”

“Geezer,” Viktor huffs under his breath in a bit of impolite Japanese he’d picked up─ a private joke meant for Yuuri’s ears only.

He waits for Yuuri to laugh or even lovingly scold him for being disrespectful. The Japanese skater does neither. Instead, he shifts his bag as if redistributing the weight of the skates inside and says, “He’s right, though. You should stay.”

“ _What?_ ” Viktor gawks.

“It’s like he said. You’ve given me too much attention, maybe. You haven’t really had enough to time to concentrate on your own skating. Even if we agreed to do things this way, it’s not fair that you haven’t been able to really devote yourself like you need to.”

“Huh?”

“You should stay,” Yuuri reiterates. “Everyone else is already gone, so you’ll have the ice and Yakov to yourself. It’s a good chance. I’ll go home first.”

“But I promised I’d help you do a test run with your styling today,” Viktor starts.

“It’s not that important, and Yakov is pretty mad,” Yuuri says, glancing over Viktor’s shoulder.

“He’s _always_ mad. You know that. Let me just─”

“It’s okay,” Yuuri says. “I’m sorry. It’s kind of my fault, after all. So just... work hard today, okay? Yakov is a good coach, and he just wants you to be ready. Appease him a little.”

“Vitya!” the old Russian man crows again.

“I want to go home with you,” Viktor whispers with a petulant sigh.

Yuuri smiles gently and leans over the wall to drop a kiss on his forehead. “I’ll reward your hard work later. You choose how,” he says with a wink. “So give it your best, _Viten’ka_.”

“Unfair,” Viktor breathes, both lustily and begrudgingly placated.

Yuuri smirks, his eyes glittering in the late afternoon light. With a squeeze of the hand, Viktor pushes himself off the wall and sails backward with his hands behind his back and a lovestruck grin plastered on his face. Yuuri gives him a small wave, then turns and heads in the opposite direction.

Viktor flips his blades to face the still-fuming red-faced man on the other side of the rink. “Okay, Yakov,” he sing-songs, “Let’s try again from the top.”

* * *

 

The smell of garlic and ginger wafts through the hall as Viktor approaches the door of the apartment and it’s only that much more potent when he finally yanks on the doorknob and steps over the threshold. The sizzle and popping of something on the stove reminds him of the cicadas during his summer in Japan─ a deafening kind of white noise that can either be comforting or annoying, depending on one’s mood. Today, for Viktor, it’s the latter.

He drops his bag next to the small table just inside the door where mail and house keys go once the door has closed. Kicking off his shoes, he slumps into the living room where he can see Yuuri in the kitchen, cooking dinner. His back is turned to Viktor while he fusses over something or other.

“I’m home,” Viktor says gruffly in Japanese before flinging himself backward onto the couch and draping his legs over the armrest.

Yuuri startles with a loud bleat. “You surprised me! I didn’t hear you come in,” Yuuri calls back over his shoulder. After a moment, the sizzling quiets and Yuuri appears over Viktor’s head. “Welcome back.”

“Yeah,” Viktor sighs before closing his eyes.

“You stayed pretty late again.”

“Yeah,” he says again.

“....Dinner’s ready,” Yuuri offers.

“I’m not really hungry,” Viktor replies.

“Then how about a shower?”

“Later,” Viktor says.

“You haven’t even taken your coat off yet,” Yuuri points out.

With a long groan, Viktor jerks onto his side to roll his back to Yuuri. “I _just_ got home after rehearsing for _hours_ and I’m _exhausted,_ Yuuri. Can I get a moment to relax, _please?”_ he snaps.

He can feel the frown at his back, the dark, thick brows drawn in close to one another, the clenching and unclenching of fists. “I’m just worried about you!” Yuuri lectures.

“I’m _fine_ ,” Viktor huffs. “Just leave me be for a minute, okay?”

“You’ve been doing double practices for weeks now. If you keep going like this, you’re going to kill yourself,” Yuuri retorts. “Even Yakov told you to knock it off.”

The sigh that puffs out from Viktor’s lungs is longer and more dramatic than it really needs to be, but Viktor can’t quite bring himself to care just now. He’s drained both physically and emotionally, and Yuuri’s pestering grinds in his ears.

“China’s only a week away,” he sighs. “It’s just until then. I promise I’ll be _fine,_ so _please_ stop nagging me about this. It doesn’t help.”

“I’m not _nagging,_ I’m just saying maybe you should take it easy before something─”

“I can’t _take it easy,_ Yuuri,” Viktor clips. “Not all of us have the luxury of an already-secured spot in the Final, you know.”

The silence that follows feels heavy enough to crush the air out of Viktor’s lungs. Maybe he’d said too much. No, he most definitely had. Just as he shifts to peek over his shoulder and assess just _how_ much, something with a sharp corner stabs him just under the back of his ear before falling into the space between his back and the cushion.

“I love you, but you can be a jerk sometimes, you know that?” Yuuri spits. “Those came in the mail today, in case you cared.”

Yuuri’s footfall is heavy as he stomps away, and the slam of their bedroom door makes Viktor flinch. Reaching behind him, he paws around for whatever Yuuri had thrown and brings it in front of his face. He stares at a pearly white envelope with no inscription on the front. Turning it over, he lifts the flap and gently pulls out a sturdy rectangle of power blue cardstock lettered in white calligraphy with a white paper lace overlay along one edge. It’s an invitation to their spring wedding and it’s perfect.

His stomach drops so fast that he’s sure it must have fallen down into his feet. There’s no other explanation for why they feel like big, clunky cinder blocks as he rolls off the couch, there just to trip him up and slow him down.

“Yuuri, wait!” he calls as he scrambles toward the bedroom.

* * *

 

It’s the fucking triple axel. When his blade connects with the ice, Viktor knows it’s bad. The only thing sharper than the collective gasp that rockets through the crowd is the pain that grips him when his ankle rolls under him and his face hits the ice. Nothing is broken, he doesn’t think, but he feels the warm stickiness of blood ooze out of one nostril and the instant swell pushing against the inside of his boot.

But Viktor is, if nothing else, a professional, and his program (which had been flawless up until this moment) is only moments away from drawing to a close. He’s back on his feet in an instant to launch himself into his final combination spin before a drop of blood can even hit the ice. He tells himself over and over it’s only a sprain; he’s had enough to know what it feels like. The spinning is torture, but he grits his teeth and lets adrenaline work its magic. Somehow, Viktor manages to complete his final components. The final notes of his music die and he’s left in his final pose his legs crossed demurely and both arms stretched out before him, palms up with his index fingers pointing to the place Yuuri, who hadn’t been assigned to China but had come as support, should be standing.

But Yuuri isn’t there. He’s running for the gate in the boards and takes to the ice in his sneakers just as Viktor collapses in a heap, no longer able to ignore the pain. Yuuri must be calling his name as he flies across the ice, but the roar from the crowd makes it impossible to know for sure.

The younger man drops to his knees before Viktor and grabs him by the shoulders. “Viten’ka! What happened?!”

Viktor pushes himself to a sit and wipes his nose with the back of his half-gloved hand. A smear of blood stains the white fabric. “My ankle,” he says weakly.

“Which side? Can you stand?”

“Right, and I think so, if you help me up,” Viktor says.

Moving to Viktor’s right, Yuuri slips his arm under Viktor’s armpit and lifts in time with the Russian. With his fiance’s help, Viktor is able to glide on just his good foot, keeping the other bent at the knee so that his gold blade doesn’t touch the ice below. Slowly, they make their way across the ice together while the crowd chants Viktor’s name. When they approach the sideboards, Yakov is yelling for a medic to meet them in the kiss and cry.

When they step onto solid ground. Viktor leans against the wall and asks Yuuri to help him take off his skates. He knows he won’t be able to get back on the ice tonight, no matter the outcome, and he’ll have to do it for the medic anyway. Yuuri nods and drops into a squat before unknotting the laces of his right boot first and pulling at them to loosen their hold across the tongue. Viktor watches the swath of dark hair sway at Yuuri works and he sighs.

“You want to say ‘I told you so,’ don’t you?” he asks quietly, hoping the nearby cameras won’t pick it up.

“No,” Yuuri says with a brief glance upward. And then he offers Viktor a sympathetic half-smile before adding, “But I did.”

“Yeah,” Viktor sighs with a defeated grin and an apologetic shrug of his shoulders. “You did.”

* * *

 

“Can you tell our viewers what you were thinking when you took that spill?” a perky reporter asks, shoving her microphone in Viktor’s face.

Viktor shifts in the hard, metal chair a staff member had brought out into the hall so that he could complete the usual post-event interviews with a modicum of comfort. He can hear Yuuri snicker at his side as he awkwardly tries to put a bit of distance between the foam covering of the mic and his nose.

“I knew as soon as I jumped that it wasn’t going to be clean,” Viktor says, “but I didn’t think I’d take such a hard fall. Luckily, it’s just a sprain. With some rest, I’ll be back on the ice in no time.”

“And your nose?” the woman asks, seemingly unaware that her mic may be the thing that breaks the very body part she’s asking about.

“Just a nosebleed from the impact,” Viktor says, ducking to one side. Yuuri snorts and Viktor sneaks a glance over his shoulder to see the Japanese man’s hand fly up to cover his mouth and nose in an attempt hide his merriment.

“That’s a relief to hear,” the reporter says with a smile full of teeth so white, they’re distracting. “And even with that fall at the end, you came out on top tonight! You must be excited about winning the Cup of China and securing your spot in this year’s Grand Prix Final!”

“Of course,” Viktor smiles congenially. “This wasn’t an easy win, but it gives me a lot of confidence heading into the Final.”

“That’s right. Your win came down to less than half a point over Jean-Jacques LeRoy, the bronze medalist from last year’s Final. He will also be heading into the Final this year, along with last season’s other two medalists, Yuri Plisetsky and Yuuri Katsuki. Are you already feeling the pressure?”

Viktor glances over at Yuuri again, who has managed to control himself. Yuuri presses his lips into a flat line and lifts his brows, also interested in the answer. Viktor turns back to the woman and flashes his perfected camera-ready smile.

“There is definitely an element of pressure. I know they won’t make it easy for me, but in order to meet their challenges, I’ll use that pressure as motivation to really push myself to get every detail perfect. I don’t plan on making it easy for them, either.”

“Well, thank you for taking some time to talk with us, Mr. Nikiforov, and good luck in the Final.”

“Thank _you,”_ Viktor chirps.

While the cameraman collects his cords and equipment to follow his partner to her next interview, Viktor slumps back in the chair and rests his head on the wall behind him. His eyes slide over to Yuuri, who is curiously silent and looking down at his feet.

“Yuuri?” he asks.

Yuuri’s head snaps up. “Hm?”

“Everything okay?”

Yuuri blinks twice and then nods, pushing himself off the wall. “I’m going to go get some fresh ice for your ankle,” he says before turning and jogging off toward the area designated for first aid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thanks for the comments and kudos. It's really exciting to see people get into it.
> 
> This chapter hopefully cleared up some things about how the forgetting actually happens, what it actually does, and how Viktor plans to handle the possibility of finding out via media, interviews, the internet, etc. As always, every scene is intentional, as is the wording of much of what they say to each other, so if you read closely, you may start picking up on what's going on with Yuuri. I'd love to hear your theories (though I won't answer any of them directly because, you know, that's half the fun of this particular fic). 
> 
> Next chapter up around Friday. Until then, come visit me over on tumblr [@hanarezu-ni](http://www.hanarezu-ni.tumblr.com) for all that YOI-y goodness.


	5. In Medias Res

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _In the middle of things_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bad language. Mostly from Yurio. (100% from Yurio.)

Viktor is practically flying down the hall, keys out and ready to fling the door open just as soon as he is able. He pulls on the knob so hard that it whips all the way back on its hinges and comes within centimeters of smacking into the wall and leaving a nice doorknob-sized dent. A flash of brown comes barreling toward the door just as he steps inside.

“Makka!” Viktor calls, tossing his bags to the side so he can ready his open arms to receive the standard poodle who is now soaring through the air.

The bags hit the small hall table, or maybe Makkachin does when he jumps, or maybe it’s Viktor when he loses his center of gravity once the dog is in his arms. It’s hard to be sure, but the dog, the man, and everything on the table goes flying all at once. Viktor finds himself pinned to the ground by two large paws on his chest and a wet tongue licking enthusiastically at the side of his face. He laughs as he reaches up and lovingly tugs on the dog’s cheeks.

“I’m home, Makka! I’m sorry I’m so late. Mean old Yakov made me stay in Sochi for a whole week after the Final just to rub elbows, and I missed you _so much_! Did you miss me?”

Makkachin’s tongue lolls out and slurps over Viktor’s cheek again in response. With another laugh, Viktor pushes his companion off and sits up among the disarray. “Looks like the doorman took good care of you,” he says to the dog as he looks about, “and he even collected my mail for me? We’ll have to go thank him again later, won’t we?”

Makkachin woofs. On his hands and knees, Viktor shuffles around and collects the scattered envelopes, the tray where he leaves his keys, and a small square photo frame that holds his favorite picture of Makkachin as a puppy.

“Is that everything? ” he asks aloud after standing to place everything back in its place on the table. He turns to glance at the floor, but Makkachin is impatient and already shoving his large head under Viktor’s hand in a silent demand for his continued attention.

“Okay, okay,” Viktor says warmly. “Come help me unpack, then. I have so much to tell you!”

He grabs his bags and heads toward the bedroom with Makkachin at his heels. Once inside, the dog jumps up on the bed and barks at his owner just as Viktor swings his suitcase up on the mattress.

“Of _course_ I took gold,” Viktor grins, “but Makka, something else _amazing_ happened!”

Instead of unlocking his bags, Viktor sits on the edge of the bed and pulls his phone from his jacket pocket, swiping to unlock the screen. The mattress dips as the poodle creeps closer to rest his heavy head on Viktor’s shoulder while the man taps intently at the display.

“Makka, I _met someone,_ ” Viktor gushes as he opens and album and starts scrolling through photos slowly so his dog can properly inspect each one. “He’s a skater from Japan, and he was absolutely _beautiful_. He asked me to dance with him, can you believe it?”

He swipes to the next shot in the roll, which happens to be his favorite. The Japanese skater is dipping him backward with one hand gripped firmly on Viktor’s pointed leg and the other cupping the side of Viktor’s face. Viktor is bracing himself with a hand to the other man’s back, and they’re both laughing with wide, open smiles. Makkachin makes a throaty sound and leans in to sniff at the phone.

“It was the most fun I’ve had in _ages,”_ Viktor sighs dreamily. “He dances like a dream, you know. And at the end of the night.... Oh, Makkachin, listen to this. He asked me to come to Japan and coach him! I know it sounds crazy, but I think I might really do it!”

Another contented sigh falls out of Viktor’s mouth; he tips back onto the mattress and holds the phone over his head so he can scroll backward through each photo and then forward again. Makkachin curls up in a ball at his side.

“Makkachin,” Viktor says softly, dropping a hand on the dog’s back to scratch lazily, “Am I in love?”

The dog yawns wide, his tongue curling before he settles his head on his paws and closes his eyes.

“Yeah,” Viktor smiles, pressing his phone to his chest, “I think so, too.”

* * *

 

“This is it,” Viktor says as he steps off the bus behind the Japanese man to stand before a large expanse of greenery behind a wrought iron fence. “These are the gardens. The palace is over that way if you’d like to see it.”

Yuuri turns to smile over his shoulder and shakes his head. “I think I want to see the gardens if that’s all right,” he says, shifting the tattered old rucksack on his back. “Maybe we can see the palace too if there’s time.”

Viktor slips his hands into his pant pockets and shrugs with an easy smile as he comes to stand at Yuuri’s side. “Anything you like. I’m just the tour guide,” he jests.

A shy chuckle slips out of the shorter man. “Well, I’m sure you have other things to do today. I don’t want to keep you all day.”

“Oh? That’s too bad. I wouldn’t mind being kept all day,” Viktor hums. He takes a step forward toward an opening in the perimeter fence, but not before noting the lovely shade of red that douses Yuuri’s cheeks. “Coming?” he sing-songs over his shoulder.

“Y-yes!” Yuuri sputters in response.

Inside the gardens, the two men walk side by side along intersecting pathways. Yuuri is mostly quiet, his brown eyes scanning the lawns and benches where families play or lovers sit close together and speak in whispers and light touches. He smiles softly as he takes in their surroundings, but Viktor can feel disappointment radiating off of his new friend. It’s in the slight sag of his shoulders and the way his eyes jump from spot to spot, sparkling as they search for something they can’t seem to find.

“Something wrong?” he asks as they cross a narrow bridge to a small concrete plaza that juts into the pond that overlooks the back side of the green-roofed dome of at the center of the palace.

“No,” Yuuri shakes his head. “It’s very nice, but...”

“But?” Viktor coaches.

“Well, you said it was a garden. I guess I just somehow thought there’d be more... plants? I wouldn’t call this a garden, really. It’s more like a park, isn’t it?”

A flock of ducks float lazily by, quaking intermittently. To the left of the small peninsula where they stand, a little boy is tossing small pebbles, leaves, and sticks into the water while his father crouches nearby with a professional camera to capture the moment. Behind them, a large soccer field is hosting an informal game between a handful of teens in tees and soccer shorts.

“I guess so,” Viktor agrees as he turns a half circle to consider the scene. “So you like plants, then.”

Yuuri lifts his glasses a bit and rubs at one eye with the knuckle of his index finger. “I mean, I do, but not _especially_? I just had a different image in my mind is all. Big fronds or flowers. At least a fountain, maybe?” he turns and smiles sheepishly at Viktor. “I don’t know. I’m being weird, aren’t I?”

The angle of his thick brows and the way he titters a bit when he accuses himself of being strange does something to Viktor; it’s like someone tugs at strings threaded into his heart if such a thing were real. He touches his chest lightly before catching himself and stuffing his hand back into his pocket.

“Maybe a little,” Viktor says, “but what’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing, I guess,” Yuuri laughs and then takes his phone out to snap a few shots of the palace across the water.

While the other man pinches his fingers on the screen to zoom the lens, Viktor scans the edge of the lake and spies an older man setting up a blank canvas on an easel on the other side of the water. Inspiration strikes. “Yuuri, wait here for a moment. I’ll be right back,” he instructs, taking off into a light jog back over the bridge they’d crossed earlier.

“Huh? W-wait! Viktor?” Yuuri calls out behind him.

Viktor turns to wave a wordless reassurance over his shoulder. Yuuri simply lifts his hand, palm facing outward in response─ a promise to stay put until Viktor returns. The strings in Viktor’s chest yank harder, urging him to stay close lest they pull too taut and snap. The sooner he goes, the sooner he can return; he breaks into a full sprint toward the old man.

* * *

 

“Hey, _shithead_ ,” a familiar voice curses. An apparent shove of a foot into the bar stool on which Viktor is slumped over rattles the Russian man.

“Mmm,” Viktor grumbles as the stool tips to one side and then rocks back in place.

“You’d better wake the fuck up right now, or I’m going to go tell Yakov you’re here again.”

The coolness from the bar top eases the heat in his cheek as Viktor rolls his head from one side to the other to look at the blonde teenager standing beside his bar stool.

“Yurio,” he croaks, “You’re too young to be in here.”

“Don’t fucking call me that,” Yuri snaps, “I don’t want to hear that name ever again. Not after what that pig did.”

“Mmm,” Viktor groans again.

“You’re a mess, you know that?” Yuri sighs, tugging the hood of his parka down low over his brow when the bartender eyes him suspiciously. “Lunch break ended an hour ago and Yakov is pretty pissed off.”

“Tell him I went home. My head hurts,” Viktor mumbles, burying his face into his arms.

“I bet it does,” Yuri scoffs. “How much did you drink?”

“Not _nearly_ enough,” Viktor quips.

“I doubt that,” Yuri says, grabbing Viktor’s phone from off the bar.

Viktor peeks over his elbow and weakly protests when Yuri swipes to unlock the screen, “Hey. That’s private.”

“Then use a fucking password,” Yuri snorts before glancing down at the screen. His face twists in disgust. “Have you just been sitting here mooning over his pictures while you drink yourself stupid?”

“So what if I have?” Viktor counters, reaching out to snatch the phone back. “It’s none of your business.”

The young skater rolls his eyes, but a shift on his feet indicates a shift in tone.

“Viktor,” he says, voice still salty but tinged with what might be considered concern, “how long are you going to let him ruin you like this? It’s been weeks and he’s not going to come back no matter how much of a stupor you drink yourself into. I’m─ _everyone_... I mean, _Yakov and the others_. They’re worried about you.”

Viktor finally lifts his head and grabs for the empty tumbler on the counter in front of him. Bringing the glass to his lips, he pounds back the bit of watered down whiskey at the bottom. “And what would _everyone_ have me do, hm?” he rails just a little too loudly. “Just _forget_ him? Pretend it never happened?”

The sharpness in Yuri’s gaze catches Viktor and holds him in place. “Maybe that’s _exactly_ what you should do,” the blonde says.

* * *

 

“Yuuri! That man over there said there’s a greenhouse just down the street. It’s affiliated with the palace and the gardens, and it sounds like it’s just what you were looking for!”

Viktor comes to a stop just in front of Yuuri, chest heaving slightly. Yuuri shifts on his feet and glances over Viktor’s shoulder at the old man Viktor had gone to speak with.

“Huh?”

“He’s a painter,” Viktor explains, pulling his wallet from his back pocket. As he fishes for and locates a small rubber hair tie from the coin compartment, he smiles. “Not like a famous painter or anything. Just as a hobby. But I figured someone who likes to paint scenery might know where to find some flowers.”

“You just... randomly asked a stranger if he knew a place with flowers?” Yuuri asks, his hand clutching at the shirt under his jacket.

“He’s my uncle.”

“Oh! R-really? Wow, that’s a coincid─”

“That was a joke,” Viktor says with the tie held firmly between his lips.

Yuuri grins awkwardly. It’s adorable. “Oh.”

“You said you wanted to see flowers and big leaves, right?” Viktor asks, tilting his head to one side as he works his hair into a small bun at the back of his head.

“Y-yeah,” Yuuri nods.

“Shall we go, then?” Viktor suggests, pushing a few stray strands behind his ears. “It’s just a few minutes that way,” he points to the left of the palace.

“Um, yeah. Okay, sure. Let’s do that,” Yuuri says. “....Thank you.”

“Anytime,” Viktor grins wide. He grabs for Yuuri’s hand. “Come on, there’s a closer exit this way.”

Yuuri, Viktor notes, doesn’t resist or pull away. In fact, after a bit of hesitation, he returns the gesture with his own light grip.

As they make their way out of the gardens (but not without getting turned around exactly twice), Viktor steals a glance at the shorter man every few silent steps.

“So,” he says in his best casual tone, “Why did you quit skating?”

Yuuri chews on his lip for a moment. “I just wasn’t cut out for it after all. Too much pressure. My anxiety often got the best of me.”

“You said you competed in the Grand Prix once,” Viktor says. “But I don’t remember you at all.”

“We must not have been assigned to the same events,” Yuuri says. “I qualified for the Final that year, but my dog died and I just... couldn’t do it. So I withdrew, and then I retired.”

Viktor hums beside him.

“It must sound stupid, quitting because of a dog,” Yuuri says.

“Not at all,” Viktor shakes his head. “I had a dog too, and I was a mess after he died a couple years ago. Besides, it wasn’t just about the dog, right? You said so yourself... you just weren’t cut out for it.”

Yuuri’s shoulder slump.

“It’s not criticism! There’s nothing wrong with knowing your own weaknesses, is there?” Viktor counters quickly. “I think that’s also a sort of strength, actually.”

Yuuri lifts his brows and looks up into Viktor’s eyes with a curious stare that settles somewhere between a question and an answer.

“What?” Viktor says with a small frown. “Did I say something strange?”

“No,” Yuuri shakes his head. “It was... a really nice thing to say, actually.”

The shy smile Yuuri unleashes makes Viktor suddenly hyper aware that they’re still holding hands. He feels his face heat and lets go of Yuuri with a mumbled apology. Yuuri clears his throat and looks down at his shoes as they pass through the gate and turn up the street toward the direction the old painter had indicated.

“What about you?” Yuuri asks after a long silence. “Why’d _you_ retire?”

The Russian stretches his neck to one side and tries to laugh, but it comes out a little empty. “Too old,” he says. “I just couldn’t keep up, so I figured it was time to bow out gracefully.”

“Do you miss it?” Yuuri asks.

“Sometimes,” Viktor admits. “But I was fortunate to compete for as long as I did, and it’s not like it’s this thing that exists only in the past, you know? Now I’m coaching and choreographing for my successors. You?”

“Not much changed for me,” Yuuri says. “I still skate a lot, actually. It’s always been something I just did for myself. Even when I competed, I didn’t really keep up with the skating scene. I just went out there and did my best without looking much at who was around me... at least I didn’t until Minami-kun asked me to coach him. Now I sort of have to.”

“What made you decide to coach?” Viktor asks.

“He said he was my biggest fan.”

“That’s sweet.”

“And I needed the cash,” Yuuri grins. Viktor laughs.

* * *

 

Viktor sits at the table in his flannel pajama set, the top unbuttoned and hanging open. His laptop is open in front of him so he can loop video of Yuuri’s run-through of his short program from the morning while he nibbles at the sandwiches on his plate and listens to the sounds of his fiance cleaning and scrubbing like a madman. He’d been on a rampage since they’d gotten home, and now he is aggressively attacking the wooden floors in the living room.

“Yuuri!” he shouts over the sound of the vacuum. “You need to concentrate on your sit spin! You traveled a lot this morning!”

“What?!” Yuuri calls back.

“Your sit-spin!” Viktor shouts.

Yuuri frowns and turns off the vacuum. “I can’t hear you.”

“Because you’re vacuuming,” Viktor points out. “I said, you need to be more mindful of your sit spin in your short program. You were all over the ice during rehearsal this morning.”

“Do we have to talk about this now? I’m sort of busy,” Yuuri sighs, gesturing to the vacuum and an assortment of cleaners in brightly colored bottles sitting on floor near the couch.

“I just wanted to tell you while I was thinking about it,” Viktor says before pulling the tomato out of his sandwich and eating the slice on its own. “You know I forget easily. And why are you suddenly so passionate about cleaning, anyway? You’ve been going non-stop all afternoon.”

“Well, it’d go a lot faster if you’d help me,” Yuuri huffs, wiping beads of sweat from his hairline.

Viktor slides out of his chair and crosses the room to slide his arms around Yuuri’s waist just as soon as he’s able. “I’m happy to do anything you ask, my love,” he purrs. “But might I suggest a break first? We could take a nap.”

Yuuri bats at Viktor’s chest and leers at him from over the top of his frames. “When you say nap, you never actually mean nap.”

“Is that a bad thing?” Viktor coos.

“We have to clean the apartment, Viktor,” Yuuri insists. “You’re leaving for Europeans tomorrow, and I’ll be heading back to Hasetsu the next day. No one will be here for a while, and do you really want to come back to a dirty apartment?”

“You’re still mad that I’m going, aren’t you?”

Yuuri sighs loudly. “Are you going to help me or not?”

Viktor leans down and kisses Yuuri lightly. “Fine, fine. But let me do the vacuuming. I don’t know _what_ is going on in the bedroom. It looks like the closet exploded all over the bed.”

“Sorry,” Yuuri says, stepping aside so that Viktor can take the vacuum from him. “I just... thought it was a good chance to go through my clothes and get rid of some things. I’ll go clean it up.”

“Sure,” Viktor smiles.

Yuuri returns the smile with his own tired one. And then he tips up on his toes and kisses Viktor long and slow.

“...I’m sorry, Viktor.”

“Don’t be,” the Russian replies, running a thumb over his fiance’s bottom lip. “I know you’re right. You’re always looking out for me.”

“Yeah,” Yuuri grimaces before turning in the direction of the bedroom.

* * *

 

The sound Yuuri makes when they step inside the greenhouse is overshadowed only by the sound that gurgles out of Viktor. It’s breathtaking, really. Giant leaves, some as long as Viktor is tall, fill every nook and cranny, green on green against a clear blue sky that spreads overhead above the curved glass walls. The humidity hits hard at first, but as they walk deeper into the hall, they adjust.

“There’s even a fountain,” Viktor teases, tugging on Yuuri’s jacket and pointing to a square pool up ahead.

“This is beautiful,” Yuuri breathes with a slack jaw. He turns a complete circle twice and then comes to a stop to flash a thankful grin at the Russian.

“It really is,” Viktor nods. “I can’t believe I’ve never come in here.”

Yuuri’s phone appears in his hand; he sets up frame after frame of the foliage against the arching windows and snaps a few of the sky through the roof. Viktor stands a few steps behind, letting his gaze follow whatever direction Yuuri points the camera in. When he’s looking upward at a flock of seagulls flying outside overhead, Yuuri spins on one foot and snaps a picture of him.

“Hey! You should warn someone before you take their picture,” Viktor pouts as he playfully reaches for the other man’s phone.

Yuuri presses the phone to his chest and grins. “I had to,” he insists. “I want to remember the famous stranger who took me sight-seeing, and you just looked...well, see for yourself.”

He hands his phone over to Viktor who looks down to see himself, sharp jaw tilted upward, shoulders relaxed, and a peculiar smile on his face that gives his whole presence a nostalgic atmosphere. His eyes aren’t quite focused, like he’s pondering something bittersweet. Viktor frowns; the image unsettles him for reasons unknown.

“I look ridiculous,” he says, forcing a smile. “You can see up my nose.”

“You look ethereal,” Yuuri corrects gently.

It isn’t the first time someone has said so about him. As a skater, “ethereal” was a favorite descriptor of newscasters and commentators when they spoke about his programs. It was just a word, like so many others. But on Yuuri’s lips, it sounds like a confession of something deeply personal, and Viktor’s cheeks burn accordingly.

“You can delete it if you really hate it,” Yuuri offers, and the guilt Viktor feels when he sees the Japanese man’s lip pull downward hits him hard.

Viktor shakes his head. “No, it’s fine. But I think you’ll need a better one.”

Under his thick shirt and jacket, Yuuri’s waist is surprisingly trim. Viktor knows because he wraps an arm around Yuuri’s lower back and pulls him in by the hip until they are pressed together close enough that Viktor can smell Yuuri’s hair, a mix of soap and rain. The shorter mean yelps his surprise just as Viktor raises the phone above their heads and says, “Smile!”

The shutter clicks three times before Viktor releases the other man and scrolls through the three photos. “There. These are much better,” he notes. “Do you think you can send them to me?”

“Uh? Um, okay? But how?” Yuuri swallows.

“I’ll email them to myself if that’s okay?”

Yuuri nods shakily and stuffs his hands in his pockets while Viktor’s fingers fly dexterously over the keyboard. With a final, committed tap, the Russian grins, “And _sent,”_ before he offers the phone back to its owner.

Immediately, Viktor’s own phone buzzes in his back pocket. Assuming it’s the photos, he slips it out and looks at the screen. It’s not what he was expecting; instead of pictures, it’s an incoming call.

“Yuuri, sorry. I need to take this. It’s... work.”

“Sure,” Yuuri nods before considerately moving a few feet away.

Victor frowns back down at the phone and presses the button to answer the call, bracing himself.

“Vitya,” Yakov says sternly before Viktor can speak. “Where are you?”

“I’m... not coming in today,” Viktor replies, brows quirked. He’d expected more yelling. “I needed a mental health day.”

“Where. Are. You?” Yakov demands into the phone, each word punctuated for emphasis.

“Tavrichesky sad,” Viktor answers, supplying the Russian moniker.

Over the phone, the old man takes a sharp breath in. “Are you with anyone?”

The question is unsettling. How did Yakov know? Why would he assume so, given Viktor’s tendency to keep to himself? And what business is it of Yakov’s if he _is_?

“No,” Viktor lies. “Why?”

“Vitya, please,” Yakov says, softer. “Please tell me if you’re with someone.”

“....No one,” he lies again. “Look, Yakov. I know I was supposed to help out with the start of the camp today, but I just felt... off this morning. I promise I’ll be back tomorrow, okay? But I have to go now.”

“Vitya!” Yakov yells into the phone. Viktor hangs up and stuffs his phone back into his back pocket. It buzzes again, but Yuuri turns to look at him and Viktor ignores it.

“Everything okay? Do you need to get going?” the smaller man asks.

“No,” Viktor smiles. “I’m all yours.”

* * *

 

“Viktor,” Georgi sighs as he sinks down into the hotel room chair. “I thought you asked me to bring wine to celebrate your fourth win at Worlds, but you look like you want to die.”

Viktor, giving no thought to how it will wrinkle his best dress shirt, rolls from his stomach to his back on the bed and sighs dramatically. “I thought he’d be here,” he says to the ceiling.

“That Japanese skater from the Grand Prix again?” Georgi asks.

“ _Yes,”_ Viktor exhales. “Where did he _go_ , Georgi? I _felt it,_ you know. Something really special between us, and now he’s just... _gone!_ He hasn’t contacted me _at all!_ ”

The dark-haired skater shrugs and uncorks the bottle he’d brought up at Viktor’s request. “Then it wasn’t true love,” he quips before tipping the bottle into a small paper cup. “Not like Anya and I,” he adds before taking a sip.

Viktor rolls back onto his stomach and shoves his face into a pillow. “Maybe he forgot all about me,” he concludes.

“Maybe,” Georgi agrees.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WE ARE ALL OVER THE TIMELINE HERE. It's supposed to be a little confusing, but I hope not TOO, TOO much so. You good? 
> 
> By the way, did you know that [Tauride](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tauride_Palace) is a real place? Because it totally is. And there really is [an actual greenhouse](https://www.instagram.com/p/BEYO3ltnXKm/?tagged=tauride) that's associated with it.
> 
> Next update on Monday. Until then, come look at a ton of YOI stuff and say hey @hanarezu-ni on tumblr!


	6. Acta Est Fabula

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _The drama has been acted out_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Implied alcohol abuse is going to be a recurring thing from here on out, just as fair warning.

The first thing he has to do is steel his face and paint on the smile he’s spent years perfecting. Not for the fans in the crowd, who are cheering (but without the usual vigor), or for the cameras and commentators (who are most certainly mulling over what they’ve just witnessed on the ice), but for Yuuri and Yakov, who are both standing behind the boards with sharp eyes trained on Viktor and identical frowns.

The announcer says Viktor’s name again and a second round of applause goes up from the stands as he relaxes out of his final pose and takes a bow, then turns to the seats behind him and repeats his greeting. Flowers hit the ice; a hoard of young girls in slicked back buns and light purple skirted leotards skate out to collect his bounty. Viktor would usually skate the perimeter of the rink and snatch a few items himself, but he needs to get off the ice _now._

As he glides toward where his coach and his fiance wait, he runs a hand through his hair and reminds himself not to flinch, to act cool. He does a pretty good job. Or at least he thinks so until he steps off the ice and falls into Yuuri’s arms. Yuuri grips Viktor’s arms tightly and puts his forehead against the Russian skater’s collarbone, but he says nothing. Yakov, on the other hand, has a lot to say, and it starts with, “You reinjured it.”

“I’m fine,” Viktor smiles as he fumbles to snap the guards over his golden blades.

“That was the worst short program you’ve skated in years,” Yakov seethes. “This is the _Final_ , Vitya. You wouldn’t skate like that unless something was wrong. When did it start hurting again?”

Viktor frowns at the old man and turns his blue eyes down to the man holding him. He’s always stood a head taller than Yuuri, but when Viktor is on his skates, Yuuri looks smaller, like he’s crumpling in on himself. An unease knots the muscles in Viktor’s chest and they’re pulled tighter when Yuuri looks up at him, his eyes reflecting pools of worry and tension.

“I’m _fine,”_ Viktor says to the both of them, though the grin he flashes is meant specifically to assure his fiance. “I just wore myself out a little during the warm-up. Too many practice jumps. Was it really that bad?”

Yuuri sighs and buries his face into Viktor again.

Yakov scoffs as he turns toward the kiss and cry. “You’re barred from practices tomorrow. And no jumping of any kind until your warm-up before the free skate. Not even floor jumps.”

“Yakov, I _said_ I’m fine,” Viktor gripes as he does his best to follow behind without hobbling or leaning on Yuuri too heavily lest he gives himself away.

“Shut up,” the old Russian spits over his shoulder. “You’re too old to act like you’re invincible. You know what’s going to happen if you keep this up... unless you’re _trying_ to cut your comeback short.”

“I’m _fine,”_ Viktor insists for the fourth time in a whisper meant only for Yuuri, for his peace of mind. “Really.”

“I trust you to know your own body, Viten’ka,” Yuuri says cautiously as he wraps his arm around Viktor’s waist and presses his fingers into the skintight fabric of his costume. “Just...don't be reckless, okay?”

Viktor returns Yuuri’s gesture with a squeeze to the younger man’s shoulders as they slowly step up onto the platform where he’ll sit to await his score. As usual, he situates himself between his coach and his partner, but the three of them are unusually silent. Yakov never talks much during the wait anyway, but the cuddling and loving whispers he and Yuuri have become infamous for are nowhere to be seen tonight. Instead, Yuuri laces his fingers between Viktor’s and squeezes hard with his eyes on the scoreboard.

Frankly, it feels wrong not to be draped all over one another, but Yuuri’s stiff countenance deters Viktor from attempting it. Instead, he runs his thumb over Yuuri’s fourth finger, a habit for when they hold hands like this. This time, though, something is wrong. There’s no gold band under his finger pad and its absence makes Viktor’s heart jump into his throat. Yuuri looks down too.

“You sent them off to be engraved right before we left Russia,” Yuuri reminds him quietly. “For the wedding, remember? You wanted to do it before we got too busy. Look, you’re not wearing yours, either.”

“Ah,” Viktor says, sheepishly as he glances at his own right hand and suddenly is hyper-aware of the missing weight on his finger. “That’s right. It totally slipped my mind.”

Yuuri smiles softly. “Which is why you wanted to get it done so early... so you wouldn’t forget later.”

Viktor chuckles fondly just before the speakers come to life, demanding everyone’s attention. All three men on the bench look upward once more, bracing themselves. Viktor places second, behind Yuri Plisetsky.

JJ LeRoy takes to the ice. Yuuri skates after. At the end of the night, Viktor’s name appears in the third slot. Yakov tells him that even an idiot’s luck will run out eventually. Viktor hopes his luck will at least hold out until the free skate is over.

* * *

 

This is the third night in a row that Viktor’s read every bit of the website. Every sentence, every word, every piece of small print─ he’s committing it all to memory the same way he imagines Yuuri did, whenever it was that he’d decided to cut Viktor out of his life. It’s a train of thought that makes Viktor sick to his stomach; Yuuri must have been reading this website right here in their apartment, just as Viktor is doing now. Viktor was probably sitting next to him while he did it.

As he sits in front of his laptop at his dinner table with an uncorked bottle of Merlot and no glass, Viktor’s fingers hover over the keyboard.

 

**Lacuna, Inc.**

Locations > Russia > St. Petersburg

_When you’re ready, we’re ready. Let us help you regain your peace of mind._

_To receive a free, no-obligation information packet on Lacuna, Inc.’s revolutionary memory eradication procedure, fill out the form below. A PDF guide will be sent directly to your inbox right away, complete with all the paperwork you’ll need for your first appointment._

 

Name: [________________________]

Email: [________________________]

Preferred language: [_(Choose one)_]

**[SEND ME THE FREE GUIDE]**

 

**To schedule an intake appointment, click here.**

 

He lifts the bottle of his lips and tips it back to take a long swig without letting his eyes leave the screen. Maybe Yuri was right. It’s been a week since his protege found him nearly passed out in a bar, but his words are still ringing in Viktor’s ears: ‘ _Maybe that’s_ exactly _what you should do.’_ Maybe he _should_ forget Yuuri. (And as he takes another long drink from the wine bottle, he wonders if maybe he’s already been trying, in his own way.)

Viktor has gone through nearly every stage of grief multiple times: denial, anger, bargaining, depression. But he hasn’t reached acceptance yet. Every time he tells himself it’s time, he spirals backward (usually into anger or depression) and has to claw his way out all over again. Sometimes it takes days. Sometimes it all happens in the span of an hour or two. It’s always exhausting. He almost always ends up hungover. Acceptance is impossible.

Still, part of him thinks purposefully forgetting is too cruel, even if Yuuri had done it first. It’s the easy way out, and even though Viktor is constantly battling a mixture of rage and hurt and betrayal, he still _loves_ Yuuri. Or at least, he loves who Yuuri was before he ran off and made Viktor a non-person in his life.

But how many nights has he sat here in the dark, liquor in hand, pouring over their photo albums or watching online videos of Yuuri’s skating routines (which are suddenly becoming harder to find, especially if he’s looking for anything from the last two seasons)? Everyone has told him they’re worried about him, about his health (mental and otherwise), and honestly, he’s starting to worry about himself. How long can he keep this up before he cracks?

He sets the bottle to the side and begins typing his name into the empty field. There’s no harm is weighing his options.

* * *

 

Yuuri looks beautiful on the center podium, standing shoulders above the blonde teenager whose usual hard stare is softened and contains nothing but awe for the gold medalist and the typically grumpy Michele Crispino who is currently weeping openly with joy as he flashes bronze for the cameras. The crowd is chanting Yuuri’s name, which he answers with a brief wave while he tries to both hold up his medal and juggle the large bouquet of purple roses while flashbulbs pop left and right.

Viktor wants to call Yuuri’s name, lift him into a tight hug, kiss every inch of his face, tell him how much he deserves this win after coming so close to grabbing it last year. But he can’t, not from the inner sanctum of the arena where he’s stretched out on a portable massage table with a cold compress strapped to the ankle that rolled under him twice in the second half of his free skate. He can only stare at the television screen that receives the live feed and concentrate on Yuuri’s humble smile instead of the scoreboard in the corner of the screen that confirms Viktor’s fourth place finish. He fails in that endeavor, though.

By the time the newest Grand Prix winner makes his way into the first aid area with that clunky gold medal around his neck and calls him ( _“Viten’ka,”_ in a tone steeped in the pity that plays over his eyes), Viktor’s mind is filled with the number four, and he forgets to congratulate his fiance. No, that’s not true. He doesn’t forget. He just doesn’t feel congratulatory right now. He’ll praise Yuuri later, when it stings less─ his heart, not his ankle.

* * *

 

Yuuri is standing in the kitchen with arms spread wide and fingers gripping the edge of the stone countertop. His head is dropped low, and his back is hunched, accentuating the sharp points of his shoulder blades under his favorite worn-out college sweatshirt.

“I can’t believe you went out on the ice today,” he complains in that strained tone that tells anyone who would hear him that he’s trying his hardest not to yell.

Viktor pulls the Velcro strap tight on his ankle brace and then drapes his arms over the back of the couch with a long, frustrated groan. They’ve been at it all evening, from the moment he’d walked in the door after training.

“You _know_ what the doctor said,” Yuuri scolds. “You’re supposed to be _resting._ If you keep pushing yourself like this, you’re going to do permanent damage! And _then_ what will you do?”

“Europeans are in a little over two weeks. I have to get ready,” he points out to his fiance.

“Yakov told you to just withdraw! You struggled through Nationals and it’s not worth the risk right now!”

“Everyone is making too much of this,” Viktor spits back. “It’s _just a sprained ankle._ It happens to _everyone!_ It’ll heal! _”_

“It would _if you rested it properly_! You trained yourself to death right before China and then went out on the ice tired and in too much of a hurry. That’s why you got hurt in the first place,” Yuuri reminds him.

The blood pumping through Viktor’s veins is boiling already, but he bites his lip in an effort to keep himself from lashing out. He telepathically pleads for Yuuri to stop here, to not say a single word more because Viktor is exhausted, both mentally and physically, and the last thing he needs is to have his head throb while his ankle does the same. But Yuuri is red-faced and angrier than Viktor has ever seen him, and he keeps going.

“And you didn’t ‘just overdo it’ in warm-ups at the Final, either,” he accuses as he detaches himself from the counter and walks into the living room until he’s standing right in front of the silver-haired skater.

“I just─”

“That’s what really gets me, Viktor,” Yuuri cuts him off. “You _lied._ Not just to Yakov, but to _me,_ too. You said you’d only train that hard leading up to China, but you just doubled down once we got back and started preparing for the Final. You hurt yourself all over again because you were _still_ overtraining! And you’ve just kept going since!”

Viktor opens his mouth in a second attempt to protest, but Yuuri holds his hand up to stop him.

“Don’t lie again, I’m begging you. I know you reinjured it during a late night practice _before_ we left for the Final, and that you just kept skating on it like an idiot. I know because what _you_ don’t know is that I _saw_ you fall at the rink that night. You were so late coming home and it had started to rain, so I came to bring an umbrella for you. And you were there, all by yourself, skating like a demon. And then you were on the ground and trying not to scream. I _saw_ you!”

The pang of guilt Viktor feels natural. He _had_ lied about his injury. He _had_ fallen during one of the solo practices that Yuuri and Yakov and _everyone_ had begged him to give up. But if he wanted to compete with Yuuri and the others, if he wanted to truly make his comeback, if he wanted to live up to everyone’s expectations, he was going to have to be _better_ than before. Skate America had shown him that he wasn’t going to snatch up medals like candy anymore and even though he’d been proud of Yuuri’s recent winning streak, reporters’ comments on his own programs had admittedly irked him.

But that wasn’t why he’d gone to such extremes. The reason for that was the man staring at him with harsh eyes and a downturned mouth, and that man’s shrill voice has pushed Viktor’s last button.

“Why do you think I did it?!” he snaps, sitting up straight to square his shoulders. “It was because of _you!_ ”

”Me?!” Yuuri reels.

“You’re the one that kept telling me to try harder, work harder. You’re the one who told those reporters in America that I’d _definitely_ take gold in China like it was just a fucking _given. You’re_ the one who told me to make a comeback and then asked me to stay on as your coach. Do you have _any_ idea how hard it is to coach you _and_ train, Yuuri?”

Yuuri’s mouth snaps shut; he balls his fists into the fabric of his pants and his eyes are saucers behind his lenses.

“Of course you don’t,” Viktor quips. “You have _no idea,_ yet you keep taking Yakov’s side when he tells me I’m distracted or whatever. But I still wanted to make you proud. I didn’t want you to be wrong about me. So I worked my _ass_ off, and all I’ve gotten for it is complaints and this fucking bum ankle!”

“That’s not fair! I’d be proud of you no matter what!” Yuuri objects, his volume increasing with every few words. “ You... maybe it’s just hard for you not to be highest on the podium for once! You’re just feeling sorry for yourself, right? ‘Poor Viktor, he’s not the best anymore!’ But I said what I said at Skate America because I believed in you! I just wanted you to come back strong, to show everyone that you were... _are_ still an amazing skater, even if you don’t take gold!“

“You just want me to be the same skater you idolized,” Viktor scoffs, throwing his head back and closing his eyes. “But I’m not him, Yuuri. Maybe I _can’t_ be that skater anymore. Maybe I shouldn’t have tried to make a comeback after all. Maybe I’ve been trying to do the impossible.”

The apartment is so loud with _silence_ that Viktor doesn’t even think about opening his eyes. He doesn’t want to see what kind of face Yuuri is making right now. But it doesn’t matter what he wants or doesn’t want because after an eternity, loud, wet sniffs break the quiet and Viktor is forced to lift his head and see anyway.

Yuuri is crying big, ugly, sopping tears that leave trails down his ruddy cheeks and end up as stains on his drab blue sweatshirt or droplets on the wood floor beneath him. His whole body trembles, especially his shoulders, as he grits his teeth and stares back at Viktor. And before, Viktor would have apologized, would have pulled Yuuri into his arms and deescalated things so they could talk properly. But now, Viktor is just _so fucking tired._

“So it’s my fault,” Yuuri croaks through gasping breaths.

“Yeah,” Viktor mutters, turning his head to avert his gaze. “Maybe it is."

* * *

 

Milla sits on the floor surrounded by a sea of photographs. She goes through them one by one, stopping often to smile at them fondly before sorting them into one of two piles: Yuuri and No Yuuri. (The former far overtakes the latter, which are mostly older pictures of Viktor and Makkachin.)

Viktor moves through the apartment erratically with a cardboard box filled to the brim with odds and ends─ Yuuri’s laptop, a set of donburi bowls they’d bought together at an international market to use for katsudon, all of Yuuri’s medals, the few books he’d brought to Russia, his bottles of shampoo and body soap (a cheaper brand than the one Viktor used for himself because Yuuri detested spending money on things like that), a few shirts and jackets that were technically Viktor’s but that Yuuri had pretty much commandeered as his own, the mother-of-pearl cuff links Yuuri had given Viktor for his birthday, even the pathetic apology note Yuuri had left for him to find.

“Oh, this is that cute photo of Makka as a puppy!” the redhead says, tracing a finger over the poodle’s tiny face. “Isn’t this the one you used to keep next to your key tray?”

“M’done,” Viktor mumbles as he places the box on top of three others just like it stacked against the wall.

Milla glances over her shoulder and frowns. “There’s a lot, huh?”

Viktor strides back into the kitchen, grabs the opened bottle of vodka he’d purchased on the way home from his appointment and tips it into his empty glass. “He saved me alotta work by takin’ alla’iz clothes with‘im at least,” he slurs bitterly before knocking back the full glass.

“Viktor, that bottle’s already half gone,” Milla says gently, the corners of her mouth dipping further down.

“Oh, sorry. Didja wan'some?”

Pressing her plump lips into a straight line, she sighs and shakes her head before turning back to the task she’d been given. “Are you sure you got everything?” she asks.

“Ah’thing so,” Viktor replies as he refills his glass for another round. “Lemme see Makka’s pic’chur. Ahneed a d’ffr’nt photo fer’that frame.”

* * *

 

It’s that in-between time where it’s no longer night but not quite morning. Viktor had fallen asleep on the couch at some point, but it’d been a light, fitful sleep, and he’s been awake for the past hour just thinking. He pushes himself to a stand and slowly makes his way to the bedroom, careful not to put too much pressure on the leg adorned with the unattractive black Velcro brace. Just outside the door, he pauses and listens. As he suspected, Yuuri is still awake. The periodic sniffling gives him away.

Gingerly, Viktor turns the knob and pushes open the door. Inside, drenched in the golden glow of one bedside lamp, Yuuri is curled up in a fetal position on Viktor’s side of the bed where he clutches a pillow tightly with both his arms and knees.

“Yuuri,” Viktor sighs as he enters and closes the door softly behind him. “Yuuri, look. I... shouldn’t have said that before.”

Yuuri presses his face into the top of the pillow, refusing to look up even when Viktor sits next to him, the mattress dipping gently under his weight.

“It’s not your fault,” Viktor says. He presses his hands together and slides them between his knees. “You were right. I think I’m just not good at being second-rate. And I did lie about reinjuring my ankle. I didn’t want to worry you.”

Yuuri peeks over the top of the pillow, eyes red, swollen, and squinting to see Viktor in the low light without his glasses. “You aren’t second-rate,” he rasps with a long, wet sniff.

Viktor smiles gently at that; Yuuri’s quiet anger is manageable, nothing like the explosive rage he’d demonstrated earlier. He turns his knees inward and leans over the curled up man, pressing a kiss into his wet cheek. “I’m glad you think so.”

Yuuri chews on his lip before rolling onto his back under Viktor. Tenderly, he pushes a bit of silver hair behind the Russian man’s ear. “I’m sorry I yelled.”

Viktor shakes his head. “No, I’m glad you did. I need someone to yell at me sometimes.”

“Yakov yells at you all the time.”

“Not what I meant,” Viktor grins. Yuuri smiles up at him, cautiously. It’s not the million-watt smile Viktor loves best, but it’s quiet and contemplative, and Yuuri looks so pretty with his flushed cheeks and wet eyes in this lighting. As Viktor leans down once more and brushes his lips against his fiance’s, he whispers, “Please forgive me.”

Yuuri makes a stifled little noise and wraps his arms around Viktor’s neck to bring him into the kiss closer, deeper. Their hands move slowly, stopping to silently ask permission, lavishing attention, making apologies with every touch and hoping it telegraphs properly. Words are afterthoughts; they fill the space with soft gasps and gritty whines. When they’ve rid themselves of unnecessary garments and press their heated bodies together, Yuuri rolls until he’s pushing Viktor down into the mattress and straddles his pelvis.

“Let me do it,” he says, voice deep and eyes half-lidded under long, dark lashes as he lowers himself down at an intentionally painstaking pace. “You need to rest your ankle.”

Viktor tips his head back with a guttural moan and lets himself get lost in Yuuri’s delicious warmth. In the back of his head, he knows they haven’t really resolved anything, but Yuuri feels so wonderful and Viktor just _needs_ this right now. They can talk about the European Championships later.

* * *

 

“Your gate is that way,” Yuuri says flatly, pointing down a corridor just past security. “You better hurry, or you’ll miss your flight.”

Viktor looks in the direction he’s pointing and nods before turning his attention back to Yuuri. “A kiss for good luck?” he asks with a grin.

Yuuri’s shoulders slump; his frown is enough to warn Viktor that he’s about to wander into unstable territory. He’s about to step on the landmine of an unfinished quarrel. But he can’t help himself.

“I know you hate that I didn’t withdraw from Europeans,” he says carefully. “But I promise it’ll be fine.”

“I just...” Yuuri starts, his features heavy with his obvious disapproval. “I... I hate to ask this, but maybe we shouldn’t call for a few days? I need time to process my feelings about it, and I want to see my family without feeling so worked up.”

To say Yuuri’s request doesn’t cut him would be a lie. But the younger man’s tired face is undeniable, and he knows it must be difficult for Yuuri to even say it out loud. At least he’s being honest about his needs; that alone makes Vitkor want to give Yuuri what he’s asking for, regardless of how it might pain him. It’s just for now, and Viktor knows he hasn’t been the easiest to be with lately.

“A kiss to hold me over until I can come meet you in Japan, then,” Viktor says. “This’ll be the longest we’ll have spent apart since you came to live with me.”

With his bottom lip pulled taut between his teeth, Yuuri steps forward and places both of his warm hands on either side of Viktor’s frosty cheeks. He shutters his brown eyes and gently tips his chin up into a soft kiss. Viktor smiles into it and lets go of his carry-on bag to wind his arms around his fiance and pull him in until their noses are smashed against each other.

Yuuri backs out of their embrace first, lips red and puffy, and straightens his glasses. “Take care of yourself,” he says after a short pause.

Viktor nods, taking up his bag once more. “You too. Have a safe flight tomorrow, and say hello to your family for me. And at least text me and let me know you made it there.”

Yuuri nods. “Okay.”

“I love you, Yuuri,” Viktor beams.

“I love you, too, Viktor,” Yuuri replies with a hesitant wave of his hand.

One more look, one more moment to soak in Yuuri’s face before he’s deprived for a while, and then Viktor is off through the security checkpoint. Once he’s safely on the other side, he turns to blow one more kiss, but Yuuri is gone, swallowed up by a shifting mass of moving bodies and rolling luggage.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just want to reiterate here that some of the most minute details in every chapter are 100% intentional and play into deciphering the timeline, mindsets of characters, and even events that have been or will be revealed. Enjoy some critical reading, super-sleuths! :D 
> 
> See you on Friday with Ch. 7! You can always find me on tumblr @hanarezu-ni!


	7. Solitudinem Fecerunt, Pacem Appelunt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _They made a desert and called it peace_

It’s Monday, the start of Viktor’s first week of retirement. The coffee is going at its usual time.

Viktor moves to the living room and sits on the floor, slides his feet under the sofa frame, and bends his knees until they’re just right. As he lowers himself slowly to the ground, the hems of his pajama pants ride up his ankles; the fabric across his hips feels tight. It feels wrong. Bringing himself back to a sit, Viktor inspects the garment: a dingy blue-gray pair of cheap, scratchy poly-synthetic fiber, still sporting the kinds of creases that only come from being folded and sealed in plastic and obviously too short. And then there’s the matching top, which he just now notices, adorned with thick black buttons down the front. Not the kind of thing Viktor would ever buy for himself. Not the kind of thing to be sold in any of the stores Viktor regularly shops in. These aren’t his.

Viktor pulls his feet out from under the couch and pushes himself to a stand. Slowly, he turns circles and inspects his apartment. Aside from his pajamas, everything is as it always is. Nothing is out of place. But still, something feels off. It’s only when he seats himself upon the couch and really tries to concentrate on the events of the previous night that he starts to panic. Because he can’t remember it at all.

No, that’s not entirely true. He remembers bits and pieces… coming home (though from where, he can’t recall) and checking the mail in the lobby. He remembers riding the elevator and unlocking the door to his flat. He remembers greeting a neighbor who passed by before stepping over the threshold and closing the door behind him. He remembers finishing off the second half of a bottle of vodka─

That explains the gaps.

(The pajamas, however, remain a mystery. He chalks it up to poor, vodka-induced decision making.)

* * *

 

“I can’t believe you’re here,” Viktor whispers even as he wills the tears pricking at the corners of his eyes to seep back down from where they came. “You didn’t have to come.”

“And yet, here I am,” Chris quips, shouldering his oversized duffle bag.

“But _why_? Aren’t you supposed to be off on some birthday trip?” Viktor asks as he opens the door wider and steps back to offer passage into the apartment.

“I’m only staying for two days, so don’t complain,” the Swiss skater says as he squeezes past his friend in the doorway. “I heard you weren’t doing as well as you’d have me believe and I was worried.”

“I hear that a lot lately.”

Chris hums a reply as he moves inward and surveys the scene. Empty bottles litter the counter tops; photos and mementos are scattered on every surface and, in some cases, on the floor. Turning, Chris inspects the Russian next; Viktor self-consciously passes a hand over his head to smooth back his ruffled locks (and then he wipes the grease on his pant leg).

“You look terrible,” Chris says.

Viktor flinches. “You don’t hold back, do you?”

Chris shrugs off his jacket and drapes it over the back of the coach before pushing up his sleeves. “Not my style. And neither is staying in a literal pig sty. Get some trash bags.”

“What?”

The blonde man is already moving around the room, collecting glass bottles. “We’re going to clean this place up, and then we’re going to go out. My anonymous sources say that you barely leave the apartment, though judging from all these, you’re at least making it to a corner store somewhere. Do you even have food to eat in this place?”

“There are some eggs in the fridge, probably.”

“ _Viktor.”_

* * *

 

“Yura!” Viktor yells sharply for the millionth time today. “What did I tell you about the curve of your back when you do that layback? Either commit to it or change the spin!”

The teenager digs his toe pick into the ice and throws up his hands. “I _am_ committing!”

“You look like an old man who threw out his back when he rolled out of bed in the morning,” Viktor complains, arms folded over his chest. “Maybe you need to take extra sessions with Lilia to limber up. Or we could make the step sequence less complicated so you don’t get worn out so fast.”

“ _Fuck_ no!” Yuri barks.

“Then do it _properly,_ ” Viktor chides. He bends his head and shoulders backward until his spine is curved inward in an elegant slope. His arms bow out at the sides and go up and over until his hands meet to complete the circle above his head. “Like _this_.”

“That’s what I’m fucking _doing,”_ the younger skater spits.

“Not very well,” Viktor deadpans as he comes out of position. “The off-season is already over, you know. We’ve only got a month until your first qualifier, and if you don’t get it right now, you’re going to look like an amateur out there.”

Yuri grits his teeth together. “I wish it _was_ still the off-season. You actually fucking _coached_ me then, at least. Now you just bitch and moan about _everything_ I do. You sound _just_ like Yakov, you know that? Old and crotchety.”

Viktor sighs. “Language, Yura. And you’re exaggerating. I have no complaints about your jumps, and your steps are technically good. It’s your presentation that I take issue with. It’s just... lacking.”

“Shut the hell up,” the pissed off teen fires back loudly as he pulls his hair out of its braid and smooths it back into slicker, higher ponytail. With a snap of his hair tie, he adds, _“_ I’ll show you _presentation_! I’ll be better than that fucking little piggy ever was, even!”

Viktor tips his head to the side; his shaggy mop of hair falls over his face so that his fringe ends up in his mouth. He blows out a puff of air and swats the errant tresses out of his eyes. “’Little piggy’? What are you talking about?”

Yuri’s face turns gray at first and then goes sheet white when his name thunders across the rink from where Yakov is standing with Milla and Georgi. All three of them are looking back at him with wide eyes. Milla shakes her head.

“Yura?” Viktor asks.

“N-nothing,” Yuri says as his usual scowl reappears to make his eyes narrow and his mouth tight. “Nevermind. Let’s do it again, dammit. I’ll make sure you don’t have any complaints.”

* * *

 

It takes nearly the whole day to tidy the apartment. Truth be told, it might have gone faster if Viktor hadn’t been nursing a headache for most of it. By the time the sun is at its lowest before it disappears under the horizon, the rooms at least look livable again, there are fresh ingredients in the fridge and a hot meal simmering on the stove, and Viktor even has clean hair and a fresh change of clothes on.

Chris stretches out on the couch and yawns. “I’m exhausted,” he sighs as he melts back into the cushions. “That was a lot to do while jet-lagged.”

“You didn’t have to come,” Viktor mumbles from the kitchen, where he pointlessly stirs the stew Chris has put him in charge of.

“I think you meant, ‘Thank you, Christophe, for being such a wonderful friend’.”

Viktor sighs. “Do you want a drink? Wine? I’ve still got that tequila you gave me. It’s not really my style, but since you’re here...”

Chris twists his body to glance at Viktor over the couch and frowns. “Do you think that’s really a good idea, _ch_ _ér_ _i?"_

Viktor shrugs, his sharp features turned to stone with (projected) indifference; he turns his attention to the thick, creamy concoction bubbling on the stove top. “I was only offering,” he mutters as he drags the wooden spoon along the bottom of the pot.

He really should say thank you properly. Ever since all of the other skaters at the rink had pulled out their postcards─ all the same cold, black lettering on sterile white machine-cut rectangles─ Viktor has been floating. He floats to practice and pretends to be interested in shaping up for Worlds in March, pretends like Yuuri’s locker hasn’t also been emptied or that the ice doesn’t feel like it’s missing that extra bit of body heat. During the lunch break, despite Yakov’s nagging and spitting, he floats to a nearby bar where he drinks his meal and frequently passes out at the counter because he sleeps like shit at home. Even in the sleep he _does_ manage to get, he floats between pastel-colored memories of rainy days cuddled on the floor with their dog and hot cups of coffee, or of the night Yuuri let Viktor dress him to the nines so they could go to the ballet but they never made it out of the bedroom.

Everyone tries to pull him back, but Viktor had spent so much of his life keeping a moat around himself, and it’s ingrained in their interactions with him now. Excepting young Yuri (and even then, only rarely), no one dares to jump over it if he doesn’t lower the drawbridge first. And that’s not their fault. Viktor brought it upon himself. But Chris is different. Chris is like Viktor in that he does as he pleases.

“Viktor,” Chris calls suddenly. “Stop spacing out and keep stirring. The bottom will burn.”

Viktor shakes his head and gives the pot a heavy-handed stir. “Sorry. I was just... thinking. Shouldn’t this be ready by now?”

“Probably,” Chris yawns. “Make sure you take it off the hot burner, or...”

“...the bottom will burn. I _know_ ,” Viktor scoffs. With two kitchen towels, he grips the handles on either side of the large pot to move it to a trivet on the dinner table. Just as he puts forth the strength his arms need to lift and transport it from burner to table, the doorbell chimes. Viktor jumps or does something like it; the pot makes it difficult.

“Expecting someone?” Chris asks, pushing himself back up into a sit.

“No. Can you answer it? I’m... indisposed.”

Chris is quick on his feet, trotting toward the door and disappearing around the corner into the small foyer. Viktor carefully makes his way out of the kitchen, stew in hand. Behind him, he hears the clippings of a conversation in the terse, pithy Russian of a native and the amicable but poorly accented attempt of a non-speaker.

Viktor drops the towels on the table next to the pot and turns just as Chris rounds the corner with a small package in his hand. “Delivery!” he sing-songs, handing it over.

It’s a plain padded envelope, the kind with air-filled bubbles lining the inside. He tries to remember: had he ordered anything recently? Did someone tell him they were going to send him something? He can’t recall. The last three weeks have been a blur, thanks in large part to the collection of bottles Chris had thrown out earlier. Carefully, he hooks his finger inside the flap and tears along the crease. He tips it into his free hand until a receipt, a business card, and two small velvet drawstring pouches slip out.

Breathing is hard. Impossible, actually. Viktor drops the envelope and clutches his sweater. “Chris, take these,” he chokes out, his hands already shaking as he holds the tiny black bags out to his friend. “ _Please.”_

Drawing his thick, dark brows together, Chris does as he’s told. “What is this?”

Viktor slumps into a chair and bends over the table to fist his hands in his hair. “Our rings,” he croaks. “I...I sent them away to be engraved for the wedding.” He squeezes his eyes shut.

“Viktor...” Chris starts, gently.

“Get rid of them, Chris. Get rid of them, _please.”_

“Are... are you sure? That seems─”

“ _Please,”_ Viktor begs as the tremors in his hands creep slowly over his limbs and down his trunk until his whole body is vibrating. “I don’t care what you do with them. Sell them. Throw them away. I don’t care. Just _get them out of here_. I never want to see them again.”

“Alright, _ch_ _ér_ _i._ Alright. I’ll take them,” Chris shushes him with a light hand on his back.

“T-thank you,” Viktor shudders.

When his body calms itself, Chris says, “I’m going to go deal with these and then wash my hands for dinner. You get the bowls and plates, okay? You’ll feel better once you get something substantial in you.”

Standing erect takes some effort, but the Russian manages it. He scrubs his face with his hands and inhales deeply before forcing all the air from his lungs. “Okay.”

With a small pat on the shoulder, Chris pockets the pouches and heads toward the bedroom where his bag has been stowed away.

* * *

 

Summer in Saint Petersburg isn’t cold, but it definitely can’t be called hot. It’s comfortable. Still, the air inside the Tauride greenhouse is humid and makes the air outside of it seem chillier than usual when they step outside. Viktor, in just his button-up shirt, pulls his arms into a huddle and shivers.

A chuckle from his new acquaintance draws a smile from Viktor’s lips. “Are you _laughing_ at me?”

“I am,” Yuuri grins. “After teasing me for wearing too many layers, the _Russian_ is the cold one.”

“Are you always so mean?” Viktor teases.

“You’ll have to be the judge of that,” Yuuri says, shifting his bag. “Do you want my jacket?”

“I think it’ll be too small for me,” Viktor points out.

“Ah, that’s true,” Yuuri says, bringing a curled fist up to rest against his lips.

Viktor snakes an arm around Yuuri’s and presses close. “This will suffice for now,” he declares.

The Japanese man sets his lips into a thin line and clears his throat. His cheeks are tinted in a faint, delicate shade of pink. But, just like when Viktor had held his hand, Yuuri doesn’t pull away either. “Where to now, Mr. Tourist?”

Yuuri stuffs his other hand into his jacket pocket and hums as he thinks, but it’s his stomach that answers. A loud growl has Yuuri’s pink cheeks turning red and Viktor’s flirtatious smile turning into an open laugh.

“Lunch, then?” Viktor suggests.

“Lunch... would be good,” Yuuri acquiesces, averting his eyes as the tips of his ears turn the same color as his face.

* * *

 

Over a small square table in a cafe decorated with bright colors and an eclectic hodgepodge of art and dishware mounted to an exposed brick wall, Viktor gets to know Yuuri. They talk about how they fell in love with skating; Yuuri speaks fondly of a ballet teacher who planted the seed and a childhood friend who helped it sprout) and about their shared love of poodles (of all sizes. Viktor is fascinated to hear about the years Yuuri spent training in America, where he shared living space with Phichit Chulanont, who Viktor knows vaguely through Chris and has seen on the circuit a few times.

“Small world,” Viktor muses.

“Yeah,” Yuuri nods as he picks at the remnants of the pork medallions in a basil sauce he’d inhaled earlier after Viktor had first translated the entire menu and then ordered for him. “It really is, isn’t it?”

(Watching Yuuri eat is oddly satisfying. The faces he pulls as he took the first bite from each part of the meal makes the food look even more delicious, and Viktor is only slightly embarrassed that he’s even thinking such a thing.)

“I _still_ can’t believe we never met, though,” Viktor says after he dabs his mouth with a napkin to hide the way it hangs open while he watches Yuuri chew.

“Maybe we did?” Yuuri suggests, his deep brown eyes peering up over the blue rims of his glasses. “I um… actually, I have some memory loss problems. So it’s possible that we met before and I just… can’t remember.”

“Memory loss?” Viktor asks, blue eyes wide.

Yuuri takes a sip of water and nods. “After I retired, I went back to my hometown to figure out what I was going to do next, but I kept skating. Apparently one day about a year and a half ago, I took a big fall when I attempted a quad flip.”

“My signature jump!” Viktor interrupts with a smug grin.

“Oh, really?” Yuuri says, brows climbing his forehead. “That’s funny. Anyway, I guess I smacked my head pretty hard on the ice and it must have rattled something around in there because ever since then, I have problems remembering big chunks of my past. Most of the year or two before it happened is a blank, but there are a lot of other gaps, too. Even parts of my childhood are missing.”

“You say it like it’s nothing,” Viktor observes, his grin sliding into a frown. “Isn’t that scary?”

Yuuri tilts his head to one side to ponder his question. “I guess it was at first, but my doctor says nothing is wrong with me, and my family fills in the gaps when I need them to. None of what’s missing seems particularly important.” He shrugs. “So, you know, maybe we _have_ met.”

“Doubtful,” Viktor says smoothly, propping his chin up in his hand. “I would _definitely_ remember you.”

Yuuri blushes again, and Viktor knows he’s being a bit of a shameless flirt, but he’ll be damned if it’s not the prettiest shade of red. But then Yuuri looks down and fidgets in his seat, picks idly at something on his pant leg, shuffles his feet under the table, and Viktor wonders if he’s being too pushy. His strategy shifts accordingly.

“Well, to be honest, I sort of know what that’s like. Memory loss, that is,” Viktor says in an attempt to just keep the conversation going instead of letting it dissolve into awkward silence.

“You do?”

Viktor grimaces. “My last season as a competitor, I was _terrible_. I’d taken a season off and after that, I just couldn’t keep up no matter how hard I trained. I injured myself and I was pretty depressed. And bored. A terrible combination, really. So that led to an obscenely excessive amount of alcohol over the course of a few months. And _that_ led to _a lot_ of blanks.”

Yuuri stares at him wordlessly. Viktor’s stomach knots.

“Sorry, that was sort of heavy, wasn’t it?” Viktor asks, suddenly self-conscious.

“No!” Yuuri protests, raising both of his hands. “No, it’s fine. Really. I’m sorry about... you know, your blanks. And that you were feeling like that. That sounds, um... really hard.”

Viktor slides his foot forward under the table until the toe of his shoe taps lightly against Yuuri’s sneaker (Yuuri’s eyes flutter downward for a split second), and then he smiles. “Why are you apologizing? It’s not like it’s your fault.

Yuuri half-smiles.

“Anyway, I’m fine now.”

“I’m glad,” Yuuri says sincerely.

“How about you? Do you still forget things?”

The other man shakes his head, soft brown hair swaying left and right with each turn of the head. “No, it’s only stuff that happened before my fall.”

“Then we’re both fine.”

“Seems like it.”

“That’s good,” Viktor smirks, “because I wouldn’t want you to forget me”

With that pretty blush, Yuuri replies, “Me, either.”

* * *

 

“Feeling better?” Chris asks as he takes Viktor’s empty bowl and walks their dishes to the sink.

With a deep sigh, Viktor props an elbow on the table and rests his chin in his hand. “This is hell, Chris.”

“Oh, _ch_ _ér_ _i_ _,_ ” Chris says, frowning as he turns on the faucet to run water over each bowl and spoon. “I wish there was something I could do to make it hurt less. But, you know, it just takes time.”

“The other day, Yuri told me that maybe I should forget about him. Yuuri. Forget about m _y_ Yuuri, I mean. Ah, I guess he’s not─ ” Viktor clamps his mouth shut and casts his eyes down to the table with his thin brows knit together.

“Well, yes. That’s sort of the goal after a breakup, isn’t it?” Chris chuckles lightly as he scrubs a bowl into a mound of suds.

“He meant I should do what Yuuri did. Go to this Lacuna place and have him erased.”

The bowl slips from Chris’ large hands and clatters into the sink; Viktor’s head snaps up to inspect.

“Sorry,” Chris mutters, picking it up and inspecting it for chips or cracks. Satisfied, he runs it under the water once more and sets it aside in the draining rack. “What do _you_ think? I mean, I know Yuuri did it first, but do you really want to _forget?”_

“It’d make things a lot easier,” Viktor grumbles, leaning back into his chair. He tips his head over the back, letting thin, silver strands fall into his eyes.

“I don’t know about that,” Chris responds, his tone stained with doubt. “It’s just... so _sad._ ”

“But it wouldn’t be. Not if I can’t remember it.”

“I don’t know, Viktor. I mean, what do you even really know about the whole thing?”

“Nothing,” Viktor admits. “But you said it before. That’s what Google is for.”

Before Chris can make a reply, Viktor shoves his chair backward and strides to the bookshelf where his laptop sits under a thin film of dust. Yuuri had always been the computer-user; Viktor generally used his phone for daily things. His laptop was for long emails, finances, and the occasional Skype chats with Yuuri when they’d spent those weeks apart after Viktor had announced his comeback. Gingerly, he wipes the grime away and brings it and its power cord back to the table.

As he searches for the nearest plug, Chris clears his throat. “ _Cheri,_ you know I’ll support whatever decision you make. But I really must tell you that I don’t care for this idea even a little bit.”

“I’m just curious about what they actually _do_ ,” Viktor justifies, bending down when he finds an outlet. “I just want to _know_ , that’s all.”

* * *

 

Yuri wins gold at every event he competes in during the season. Viktor sits with him and Yakov at every kiss and cry and smiles for the cameras as his pupil breaks the world record for the highest combined score in men’s singles. The media praises Viktor’s coaching methods, saying Plisetsky’s legendary season is continued proof of Nikiforov’s talent as a coach. Viktor wonders how they can say that when he has no prior experience with which to compare it.

“This is for you,” Yuri says with an uncharacteristically sheepish smile as he slips his first World Championship gold over Viktor’s head.

Viktor smiles back, but he feels nothing. Somehow, he thought coaching would be more rewarding than this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all, Chris is such a wonderful friend. Writing Chris in this fic and the last one has really made him special to me. (Which is why it kills me a little that he's sort of the antagonist in the work I'm starting to put together right now since this one has already been written to completion.)
> 
> In this chapter, we finally get a little bit of a look into the versions of the past Yuuri and Viktor have made up (or had made up for them) to explain the obvious gaps in their memories, and we get a look at what life post-erasing is like for Viktor. I pick the titles of my chapters carefully to represent the overall theme of each one (the translations from Latin to English are in the chapter summaries), and I think they're pretty self-explanatory. But this one is special to me because it really encompasses a lot of the point of this story. The quote is from Roman historian Tacitus, who was referring to Roman tactics during wars with German tribes in which they'd kill or capture and sell off entire populations, then call it a victory since there was no one left to cause trouble. I think that's sort of what Viktor and Yuuri have done... they got rid of each other in a sense, and think that will be the end of pain. But we can definitely see that Viktor _isn't_ at peace. He's just... numb. And those are two very different things. 
> 
> Next chapter is up on Monday and it's THE BEGINNING OF THE END! Look forward to it!
> 
> In the meantime, come check me out over on tumblr [@hanarezu-ni](http://www.hanarezu-ni.tumblr.com) for YOI, YOI, YOI!!


	8. Verba De Futuro

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Words about the future_

In the tiny office that is taken up almost completely by an old, metal desk that is littered with papers, CDs, and a computer that looks to be as ancient as Yakov himself, the old man leans back into his chair as he simultaneously sighs and runs his big hand over his hairless dome. Viktor thought Yakov would be more... something. Angry. Betrayed, maybe. But he hadn’t expected pity.

“Vitya,” he says in that fatherly tone that Viktor has only ever heard him use a handful of times in all their many years together, “are you sure? There won’t be any coming back if you do this.”

Viktor nods. “I’ve been thinking about it for a while now,” he says. “I thought I could get through this on my own but...”

Completing his sentence is unnecessary. Yakov knows. He was a first-hand witness to Viktor’s season. He was the one to catch Viktor when he collapsed after all the other skaters pulled out their white cards postmarked from Japan. He’s seen the bloodshot eyes and the sloppy skating and the texts informing him that Viktor would be late to practice (if he bothered to come at all) because he’s nursing the latest hangover. He’d tried tough love (the kind that included a lot of yelling), but Viktor had resisted it fiercely, and Yakov’s lectures had grown fewer and farther between.

“When?” is all Yakov asks.

“My intake is scheduled for the end of the month,” Viktor says, scrubbing his face with a single hand. “The actual procedure is sometime after that. Maybe the next day or the day after.”

Yakov nods, gravely. “What about Worlds?”

“I’m withdrawing. I barely qualified for it anyway. You were right, Yakov. About everything. I can’t keep up anymore.”

The sigh that escapes his coach this time is tired and dry and not at all smug; Viktor’s head drops under the weight of the guilt he feels. Not for quitting, but for the way he is and always has been Yakov’s problem child, all the way up until the very end.

“Then I’ll draft a press release about your retirement later this week,” Yakov says, resigned. “What will you do after that, Vitya? You need a plan and a source of income.”

“I don’t know,” Viktor admits quietly. “All I know how to do is skate.”

The silence is long and the stink of mildew from years of wet blades and damp air makes it unpleasant. Viktor is just about to rise from his chair opposite the old Russian, to thank him before he heads home and downs the bottle of wine waiting on him, when Yakov leans forward on the desk and tells him, “I went to the doctor recently and the arthritis is getting worse.”

It’s such an offhand comment, so completely separate from the topic at hand, and Viktor’s brows pull inward, creasing the skin between them as he tries to work out its meaning.

“I won’t be able to get out on the ice as much,” Yakov explains. “What if you stayed here as my assistant, Vitya? You could take over Yura’s training and help me with the others as needed.”

“I.... I don’t know,” Viktor stutters. “I could? That might make things awkward for everyone, wouldn’t it?”

“I think you should,” Yakov says slowly. “I never told you, but... you were a good coach, Vitya. Good for Katsuki, but Yura flourished in his own way, too, thanks to you. You could help mold him into the next Pride of Russia. And whoever comes after him.”

“Yakov, I don’t know if─

“Besides,” Yakov gruffs, “if you don’t stay, I won’t be able to protect you, and you _need_ people, Vitya. Otherwise…”

He trails off there, his forehead creasing into craggy lines. This time it’s Viktor who doesn’t need a completion. He knows. Knows that Yakov is worried that Viktor will do something stupid. Maybe intentionally, or maybe not. Maybe because of the drinking. Maybe out of boredom. Out of loneliness. And Viktor isn’t sure he can assure Yakov otherwise with any real confidence.

“Don’t worry about the others. I can talk to them,” Yakov says.

* * *

 

It’s warm and safe, and the wooden floor beneath him is stiff and solid and cool. Beside him, his large poodle, sprawled out on his side, whines in his sleep, legs kicking to chase after some imaginary stray cat or a fat pigeon. The light that pours in through the windows is unnaturally white and bright, bright, _too_ bright, even if it _is_ summer, even if his eyes _are_ closed. It’s annoying. It’s inhibiting his ability to relax. His dog seems relaxed. Viktor should be like his dog. He rolls to his side to curl up into Makkachin’s brown curls, but as his body shifts, Viktor leaves it. Or it leaves him. Either way, his long, muscled form buries itself into the poodle’s thick coat, but _Viktor_ remains pinned to the floor, watching his body bury itself into the poodle’s thick coat. A sense of panic swirls in his mind, cut short only by a lilting, warm voice.

“Viten’ka,” comes the melodic call, half scolding, half laughter. A hand rests on Viktor’s body’s shoulder, golden ring glinting in the light, flaring magnificently. “At least nap on the _couch_.”

“S’comfortable here,” Viktor hears the voice from his detached body whine. “Right, Makka?”

The poodle huffs sleepily.

“Your back won’t thank you later,” the voice warns affectionately.

His consciousness is suddenly pinned to the opposite wall, spectating from a distance like a peeping tom or the proverbial fly. Makkachin is curled into a loose ball on the floor where Viktor’s hand droops down from where his body is laid out on the couch; his fingers trail the top of his head lazily. Viktor’s other hand is resting idly on the back of the Japanese man who is stretched out on top of him, smiling down into his face.

“You were right,” Viktor says, craning his neck to press a gentle kiss to Yuuri’s nose. “This is _much_ better.”

Yuuri smiles and turns his head, looking Viktor-on-the-wall straight in the eyes. “Aren’t I always?” he asks, his mouth a sudden, serious line. Viktor feels a sick knot form in his stomach and no air in his lungs... if he _has_ a stomach and lungs right now.

“You’re always looking out for me,” Viktor-on-the-couch continues. “For _us,”_ he corrects with a quick glance down at the snoozing poodle.

“Well, someone has to,” Yuuri replies, looking back at the Russian under him. He peppers Viktor’s cheeks with sweet, affectionate pecks.

“You’re like my second mother,” Viktor giggles.

“I’m _not_ your mother,” Yuuri pouts.

It’s so familiar, this scene. It’s like watching a movie of his past, and when Yuuri’s cheeks puff out just so, Viktor, the one watching, knows exactly what Viktor, the one under Yuuri, is going to say because he remembers saying it.

_But you could be someone’s father someday._

“But you could be someone’s father someday,” the other him says. “Have you ever thought about being a parent, Yuuri? You’d be wonderful at it, the way you take care of Makka and me.”

Yuuri chuckles. “What about skating? How could we have kids if we’re competing?”

“After we’re done skating, of course. When we have more time. I think Makka would like a little brother or sister.”

Upon hearing his name, the poodle lifts his head and his tail flops around in something that resembles a wag. Yuuri reaches down and runs a hand over his back. “That sounds nice,” he smiles, his eyes drifting back over to the place from where Viktor watches himself. It’s brief this time, almost like he hadn’t seen Viktor at all, like he’d looked right through him. With his eyes back on the man sharing the couch, Yuuri twirls an unruly strand of silver around his finger. “Your hair is getting long again.”

“I know,” Viktor whines. “I need to have a trim, but I just haven’t found the time or motivation to get myself to the salon.”

“Don’t cut it, please,” Yuuri requests quietly, pressing his face into the tufts of hair near Viktor’s ear. “I want to see your long hair again.”

“But the upkeep is such a pain. I had the energy for it when I was younger, but now I’m practically a grandpa,” Viktor complains.

“I’ll help you wash and dry it. I’ll even brush it for you. You’ll look so beautiful, Viten’ka,” Yuuri murmurs into his ear so that his lips brush along the lobe.

Both Viktors shiver at the sensation.

Just as a hand reaches up tangle long, pale fingers into rich, dark hair, just as Viktor’s head turns to lick a suggestive kiss into Yuuri’s mouth, the white light envelops them all. Yuuri disintegrates into a mixture of cherry blossom petals and sea foam. Viktor is slammed back into his body, all of his nerves curling into him like barbed wire, taking hold again, and now he is flying somewhere else.

* * *

 

The hopelessness isn’t anything foreign to Viktor. It’s like an old schoolmate you were never really friends with but always ended up hanging out with because someone else brought him along─it was just there sometimes, but it could be treated with civility to even ignored most of the time. This is different, though. This isn’t just depression. It’s despair, and despair demands attention.

When he’d woken in the morning and realized it’d already been a full week, Viktor couldn’t bring himself to get out of bed even though he hadn’t slept a wink since he crawled under the covers after coming back from practice the previous night. It’s already early evening and his eyes are red and dry; they feel heavy in their sockets, like they might roll out at any moment. He’s vaguely hungry, having only taken sips from a glass of water that magically appeared on his bedside table, but not enough to even want to think about the energy it would take to _actually chew food,_ never mind preparing it _._

The mattress dips under the pressure of another body climbing in and settling on the pillow beside him. Viktor curls into himself a little further, buries himself under the covers a little deeper.

“I _know_ this is hard...” the person next to him starts. A warm palm presses into the space between his shoulder blades and rubs small circles.

“If you say something cliche like ‘It’ll get better’ or ‘Time will heal this,’ I swear I will vomit,” Viktor snipes as he rolls over to lock his blue eyes with the brown ones framed behind thick rims.

Yuuri grimaces. “I wouldn’t say that. I know that it will always hurt a little, even if it’s been years. I remember what it felt like.” He reaches out and pushes a bit of hair behind Viktor’s ear. “But you don’t have to grieve by yourself, Viten’ka. I’m here. I wish you’d just _talk_ to me.”

Hot, salty tears sting as they form along the brim Viktor’s lower lids and spill over onto his cheeks and then onto the satin pillow case under his head. The sounds he makes are ugly, loud, and inelegant and his cheeks burn as if the sun were only inches from his face. He doesn’t want anyone to see him like this, not even Yuuri, and he raises his hands to hide his face. Except Yuuri does it for him first by pulling back the comforter and gathering him up into his arms to press Viktor’s face into the hollow space at the base of his throat. Viktor’s arms grab at his fiance and he finally lets himself go. He wails and wails until his voice is hoarse while Yuuri shushes him gently, dragging his fingers through the hair at the back of Viktor’s head.

“Makka is _gone,_ Yuuri,” he finally whispers when he’s managed to calm himself into snotty, wet gasps. “He was here, all the time. He loved me so much, Yuuri, even when I didn’t love myself, and he was _so good._ And now he’s just... _gone!”_

“I know,” Yuuri laments, and Viktor can feel Yuuri’s solid frame tremble, too. It’s easy to forget that Yuuri loved Makkachin just as much as he had. Of course Yuuri is also shaken. This is his second go-round, even. For a moment, Viktor feels guilty. Yuuri is always taking care of him, but Viktor hadn’t, until just this moment, stopped to think about how this loss might be affecting his fiance. But he _couldn’t. Can’t._ Not when he’d overheard Yuuri and Yurio talking in the locker room. Not right now, when he feels like he’s drowning in his grief. He _needs_ Yuuri’s comfort too much and has none of his own to give.

“It’s lonely,” Viktor rasps.

“I know,” Yuuri says again with a shuddering sigh.

“Yuuri,” Viktor says shakily, fisting his hands into the back of Yuuri’s tattered old shirt. “Maybe it would have been better if I’d never gotten Makka at all.”

“You don’t really think that,” Yuuri whispers as he smooths Viktor’s hair.

“I don’t know, Yuuri,” Viktor says before sobs wrack his body once more. “I don’t know! This hurts too much. I didn’t know it would hurt this much!”

“I’m here, I’m here,” Yuuri soothes. “Shh. I’m here, Viten’ka. And I’m not going anywhere.”

* * *

 

Lunch sits warm and maybe a bit too heavy in his stomach, but Viktor doesn’t think much of it. Life as a coach means he doesn’t have to be quite as strict, or at least he can cheat a little without feeling too guilty. He feels even _less_ guilty because he’s been walking it off all afternoon as he alternates between following and leading Yuuri around Saint Petersburg. He suggests all of the usual tourist destinations─ the Winter Palace, St. Issac’s Cathedral─ but Yuuri doesn’t show much interest, instead preferring to wander main thoroughfares and locally-loved spots.

Yuuri is so easy to be with. He smiles and teases Viktor like they’ve been friends for years and years, and Viktor finds himself telling Yuuri things that he hasn’t spoken out loud in months or more. He talks about the day he brought Makkachin home, the runt of a litter that had somehow become one of the biggest. He mentions Christophe and some of their more ridiculous adventures as young men, like the time their coaches had gone into a sauna together and the two skaters had made off with their clothes. He touches on his relationship with Yakov and finally gets around to mentioning that he assists the old man at the very rink Yuuri’s pupil is training at for the next week. (He offers to talk to Yakov about allowing Yuuri to observe).

They bat at each other's’ arms, and Viktor flirts heavily at any opportunity he can find. Yuuri blushes often which Viktor loves, but he is delighted to find that Yuuri can make _him_ blush just as easily─ that unassuming look belies a hidden, smart-mouthed sultriness that makes Viktor weak. At a pop-up art gallery in an outdoor square, Yuuri notices a leaf in Viktor’s hair and tries fruitlessly to direct Viktor to its exact location. Viktor stoops and tells Yuuri to just take it off himself to which Yuuri replies, with a _killer_ smirk, “You aren’t supposed to touch the art.” Viktor would groan at the pun if it weren’t the cutest thing he’s heard in years.

They look through the pictures they’d taken throughout their explorations while on a bus from one part of the city to another. When Yuuri scrolls to the dozen pictures of the greenhouse at Tauride, he tells Viktor he’s glad they heard about it from the painter─ it was his favorite part of the day.

“It was just so... _wow,”_ Yuuri breathes, pinching and spreading his fingers on the display to zoom in on glass ceilings.

Viktor chuckles but nods his agreement. “It was definitely special. I can’t believe I’d never been before.”

“What kind of tour guide _are_ you?” Yuuri teases. “Honestly.”

“The _best_ kind,” Viktor pouts, tugging on Yuuri’s ear, a punishment that the Japanese man returns in kind.

Electricity runs through Viktor’s skin, seeps down into his nerves, shocks awake things that haven’t worked properly in ages. His brain buzzes like it’s come out of "save battery" mode, his heart pumps blood more forcefully, the muscles in his cheeks start to feel sore from all the smiling and laughing he’s doing as Yuuri tries his very best (though often fails) to overcome language barriers with shop clerks and coffee shop proprietors. (“I thought you _needed_ me, but you’re speaking Russian!” Viktor pouts, scandalized, and then giggles when Yuuri falls into a string of stammered apologies, assurances, and thanks.)

This is what feeling alive is like. He had forgotten. (That terrifies him.) Maybe he’d never known. (That terrifies him more.)

It’s outside of a small bakery, enveloped in the aroma of fresh bread while standing with their backs pressed into the wall of the building as other pedestrians circumvent them on the sidewalk, that Viktor suddenly yawns, loud and uninhibited.

“It’s been so long since I’ve walked around this much,” he explains when Yuuri’s brows lift.

Yuuri slips his phone from his pocket and glances at the time with a grimace before shoving it back in its place. “I kept you all day after all,” he says with an apologetic frown. “Minami-kun said he’d be done around six. That’s only two more hours. Maybe we should call it a day? I’m sorry I dragged you all over the place. I can head back to the hotel on my own if you need to get back.”

That’s when it happens: his newfound zest for life is punched out of the Russian and the temporary nature of their companionship is thrust to the forefront of Viktor’s mind. And that terrifies him _the most._ He’s not ready to shake hands and walk away. No, no, no. Not yet. It’s too good, _Yuuri_ is too good, and Viktor just needs a little more time to cling to whatever it is about the other man that makes Viktor feel like this. Instinctively, he clasps Yuuri’s hand between both of his and leans in, pressing a kiss onto Yuuri’s unprepared lips.

“Come home with me,” he says even as he screams at himself internally for being too forward, too fast.

Yuuri’s eyes grow into saucers and his face is the deepest red Viktor has seen all day. His lips fall open to speak, then close and open again like a goldfish, but all he manages is a thick, guttural sound that gives the impression of his tongue being too big for his mouth.

“To wait!” Viktor clarifies. “A short rest. Maybe... have a drink?”

Yuuri blinks once, eyes still wide.

“Coffee, I mean! Tea. Anything. Just until your student is finished. I... I just had such a good time today. Let’s talk a little longer. If you don’t mind. Please.”

He’s sure he’s blown it. Yuuri is as frozen as the ice Viktor skates on. He’ll unfreeze and run any minute because honestly, it’d be the smart thing to do. Who does this? Who kisses beautiful foreign boys they’ve only spent a few hours with? Of _course_ Yuuri will make his getaway. As he loosens his grip on the other man’s hand to give him the chance, Yuuri clasps it tightly, and now it’s Viktor’s eyes that go round and Viktor’s jaw that goes lax.

“Okay,” the Japanese man says, his mouth set in a tight, determined line. He rolls up onto the balls of his feet and brushes his lips against the corner of Viktor’s. “...I’ll go.”

Yuuri Katsuki: full of surprises.

* * *

 

Pushing open the door to their hotel room, Viktor feels a sudden sense of vertigo. The whole room is askew like it’s been rotated, tipped to the side just a bit, and it makes his whole body swim. The bed before him houses two human-shaped lumps under a white duvet, with a sizable valley between them. The air conditioning unit hums steadily. The lights are out, bathing everything in a silver glow from the full moon just outside the window. Neither lump talks; they both lie deathly still. Two mouths are pulled into identical downward curves; two pairs of eyes, one blue and one brown, are open and staring at opposite walls.

A gold medal is on the small desk to his right, discarded haphazardly under a stack of forms and a pair of soft, leather gloves instead of displayed proudly or packed away carefully into one of the four suitcases tucked away in the farthest corner of the room. Viktor frowns at it.

Another body brushes his shoulder as it passes through the door and comes to stand next to him. Viktor tries to turn and see, but he loses control of his movements the moment the other figure settles. His neck and body are locked in place, made to face the bed and its occupants, but he sees the familiar features from the corners of his eyes. Dark, slicked back hair, a flat nose, rosy cheeks, plump lips that look so enticing when they smirk but are currently held in a regretful frown.

“You never congratulated me for taking gold at the Grand Prix Final,” Yuuri says, eyes scanning the two bodies in bed.

“Yes, I did!” Viktor retorts loudly and immediately; the figures under the covers don’t seem to notice because neither one reacts. How stupid. Of course he had.

“You didn’t,” Yuuri insists calmly, turning his head just slightly to look at Viktor. “I didn’t say anything because I knew you were upset, and you were injured. It wasn’t the right time. I waited. I thought you’d say something eventually, so I tried to be patient. But you never did.”

It’s as if Yuuri’s eyes allow Viktor to move because now he can swivel his head to look back. His fiance stands before him in his free skate costume, a long-sleeved singlet with a deep v-neck that starts out in a deep purple at the shoulders and melts to black at the hips and down into the pant legs. A million sequins make him look like a night sky. Viktor loves this costume. Yuuri is a universe. _His_ universe. Beautiful and all-encompassing and alarming in his infinite complexity.

He tries to remember a kind word passed to his lover. Surely he’d said something. He’d been so _proud_. Had he hung the medal with the others when they returned to their apartment? Had he tried his best (and failed miserably) to make katsudon, as had been his tradition ever since Yuuri had started bringing home gold after gold? He’s trying to remember, trying, trying, but everything feels foggy and he’s blanking. And that’s because there’s nothing to recall. Because Yuuri was right.

“Why didn’t you tell me? I would have said something.”

“You wanted me to beg you for a few words of praise?” Yuuri asks flatly, one brow cocked.

Bile bubbles up into the Russian’s throat and he forces himself to swallow it. It goes down like sand, gritty and irritating and wrong.

“Is that why you left me?” Viktor asks, desperate as he reaches out to take Yuuri’s hand.

Yuuri cants his head to one side and smiles sadly. “No.”

A shuffling draws their attention back to the bed, where Viktor and Yuuri have gravitated together in the center of the mattress and tangled themselves into one another in a silent embrace. Neither one smiles, but they relax into each other with their foreheads pressed together. Viktor’s eyes are closed; Yuuri’s gazes down onto his resting face, expression blank.

Viktor notices the absence of Yuuri’s hand in his; when he turns back, Yuuri is gone. Viktor is yanked backward violently through the doorway by unseen hands and then the door slams closed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I guess I can point out now that all of our timeline jumping that takes place before Viktor has the procedure done is actually _memory_ jumping. See, Viktor has to retell his story to the people at Lacuna during the recording, and then he has to relive memories by reacting to the things he packed up and brings with him for the banking procedure. And THEN they have to go into his head and actually find those memories and briefly activate them to zap them. So you've been accompanying him on that journey (maybe? I hope) without realizing it. And what's why some of it is wonky, like a dream, while other parts are straightforward, like a short story. And of course, memories aren't neat, pre-packaged things arranged in any orderly way, so that's the reason I decided that nonlinear storytelling was the only way to go for this fic. 
> 
> It's also why we haven't gotten any real confirmation about Yuuri's motives for erasing Viktor, because _Viktor doesn't know why either_ and he's been trying to find the reason as he recalls all of these things. But his understanding is only half the story, so is there really any way for him to EVER know for sure? (I'm not saying there is or isn't... just a question for you to ponder a little.)
> 
> ANYWAY, THE NEXT CHAPTER IS THE PENULTIMATE CHAPTER AND IT'S GONNA BE A DOOZY. Come check it out on Friday! Bring your tissues! :D
> 
> Until then, come say hello at my YOI sideblog, [@hanarezu-ni](http://www.hanarezu-ni.tumblr.com)


	9. Hic Situs Est

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _This is the place_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise! It's a little early! See the end notes for some news regarding the end of this fic. 
> 
> Spacing used for storytelling purposes; keep scrolling.

He can’t remember how he got here, or when. It’s pitch black, like a cavern miles underground. A chill seeps into his skin even though he can distinctly feel the weight of his top coat on his shoulders. Where are his hands? His feet? He’s touching his face, but he can’t _see._

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Yuuri?”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

_“Yuuri?”_

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“..........Yuuri..........”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

_“Viten’ka.”_

That voice, the familiar way the second syllable is stressed and stretched out when Yuuri is scolding him, is like a switch. Suddenly, Viktor is surrounded by a rush of greens, oranges, yellows, and reds, the colors that signal Saint Petersburg’s transition into autumn. It feels oddly nostalgic. A warm hand grabs his and pulls him onward down a path that skirts a large pond.

“Viten’ka, you’re spacing out,” Yuuri says, shooting an easy smile over his shoulder. “Let’s go.”

His fringe is soft and sticks out from under his knit hat; his eyes glitter behind their frames. His upturned mouth warms Viktor against the cool air.

“Sorry,” Viktor smiles, readjusting his hand to lace his fingers between Yuuri’s so he can run his thumb over the ring on his fourth finger.

Yuuri looks down at their joined hands and bites his bottom lip. “I was thinking about having our rings engraved...” he starts.

“We decided on the snowflake, I thought,” Viktor says curiously, the beginnings of a frown tugging at his lips.

“I know,” Yuuri smiles shyly, that quick, embarrassed tweak of the lips that makes Viktor melt. “But I was thinking of putting your name inside of mine, too. In Cyrillic. And maybe my kanji in yours?”

“ _Yuuri!_ That’s _so....!_ Sometimes I think you’re more romantic than I am,” Viktor giggles, and that makes Yuuri turn a pretty shade of pink. Viktor approves the idea enthusiastically, and Yuuri’s shy smile turns into a full-faced one. The silence they fall back into is natural and intimate, and Viktor finds himself humming the melody to Yuuri’s new short program as they amble along the pathway. The Japanese skater joins in at some point and Viktor lets his own voice die out in favor of hearing his fiance’s.

“By the way, where are we going?” Viktor finally thinks to ask when Yuuri, embarrassed, averts his gaze and clears his throat.

Yuuri looks back at him and cocks a brow like he’s asked the dumbest question humanly possible. “Huh? To the place nearby that I read about. I told you, here’s no good.”

“No good?” Viktor looks around. Manicured lawns surrounded by trees serve as play areas for young families; geese skim the top of the pond near an old woman who is throwing stale bread crusts. Across the water is an ornate building, yellow and green with a peculiar glass pyramid at the top. “No good for what?”

“’For what?’,” Yuuri huffs, incredulous. “For the _wedding._ You said Tauride was a garden, but this is more like a park _,_ don’t you think?”

Viktor is frozen in his place. His feet are suddenly made of granite and his arm stretches as Yuuri keeps moving forward until he can’t anymore.

“What’s wrong?” the Japanese man asks, letting their hands come unwoven as he turns to face Viktor with a frown.

“I remember this,” Viktor says softly, glancing around. “I thought we’d get married in a church. Or maybe one of the cathedrals. But you didn’t like the idea.”

Yuuri nods. “Too gaudy. And it’s not like either of us are particularly religious, right?”

“That’s what you said then, too. And then you said you wanted to get married outside.”

“So we spent all of our free time that summer visiting every garden and park in the city,” Yuuri reminds him.

“But you didn’t like any of them. Not even the Summer Garden.”

Yuuri slips his hands into the pockets of his wool coat, the one Viktor had insisted on buying for him when the temperatures had started slipping. He scrunches his nose. “It seemed too typical. But we hadn’t come here. You never even suggested it. I found it on my own when I was researching online.”

“I’d never been to Tauride before,” Viktor smiles apologetically. “I forgot there were gardens behind it.”

“But it’s _not_ a garden,” Yuuri complains again. “So we went to the greenhouse.”

Behind Yuuri, the scenery blurs and warps, all the colors bleeding into one another until they are brown, then black. Yuuri stays in focus, his posture easy and unworried as the black begins to separate out, first back into brown and then into a million different shades of greens and blues, followed by every other color Viktor can imagine. Yuuri turns his back to Viktor to take in the scenery just as it sharpens up.

The moment everything snaps into place makes Viktor flinch. A curved glass ceiling arches high over a lush landscape of fronds and flowers. His chest clutches as his blue eyes pass over the fountain and the marble statues peeking out from behind thick greenery and even though he _knows_ he stood here before, when all of this was real, it feels like the first time. But his analytic mind slips backward and he feels himself switch to autopilot, just like he used to do in competitions. Except for this time, it’s not a willing switch. It’s a decision that’s been made for him. He has a role to play in this story; he has lines to say.

“Viten’ka, what do you think?” Yuuri asks excitedly as he turns around, eyes wide as if they weren’t repeating history. “It’s so beautiful in here, but it’s like being outside! Look, you can see the sky through the ceiling!”

Viktor chuckles and moves forward to brush his shoulder against his fiance’s. “It _is_ beautiful,” he agrees. “Warm, too.”

Yuuri nods vigorously. “If it’s here, we could get married in April instead of waiting on summer for warm weather. That’d make it easier for my parents to come too since it’s not quite peak tourist season. And Worlds would be over already, so everyone else might be able to make it a little more easily, too.”

Viktor grins and grips Yuuri’s arm excitedly. “A summer _honeymoon_ , then! Oh, I know _just_ where we should go! Yuuri, there’s this _wonderful_ little island right off the coast of─”

“Viten’ka, focus,” Yuuri laughs. “What do you think, really? Can you see us getting married here?”

Viktor brings two fingers to his lips and hums as he scans the space. He imagines it, marrying the love of his life in this warm oasis. A reception might be difficult, but they could move that part to another location. Or keep the whole thing intimate and small. Those are details to be worked out later. A small string quartet to the left, perhaps, and a carpet rolled out down an aisle between wooden benches, sprinkled in flower petals. It’d end right in front of the fountain under a flower arch (if Yuuri didn’t veto it the way he’d shut down half a dozen of Viktor’s _other_ ideas for being “ _too much, Viten’ka!”)_.

And it feels right. This is it. This is where they will take their vows in front of friends and family. This is where they will formally promise each other eternity.

 

 

Will.

 

 

 

Would have.

 

 

 

Didn’t.

 

 

Tears well up in Viktor’s eyes and spill over as the impulse to act out this play fades away.

“Viten’ka?”

He’s desperate. His hands fly at the smaller man and grab blindly, uncaring for how rough his grip is, to bring Yuuri against Viktor’s chest and squeeze him closer, closer, so he can’t disappear. “You _lied_ to me,” Viktor chokes out before he sobs into Yuuri’s shoulder. “You said you loved me, but you _left_ , Yuuri! You forgot me!”

Familiar hands slide up his back and hold him steadily. “I know,” Yuuri says quietly.

“You’re terrible,” Viktor accuses around choked gasps. “You’re terrible and selfish and cruel.”

“But you’re forgetting me too, aren’t you?” Yuuri says without even a hint of spite. “That’s what this is, Viten’ka. You’re forgetting me, and then all of this will be gone for good.”

Viktor feels like he _should_ gasp at Yuuri’s revelation but somehow, he knew. He _knew._ “How can you say that when you did it first?” he says bitingly.

“I’m sorry,” Yuuri murmurs quietly, carding a hand through Viktor’s shaggy mop of hair. “It seemed like the best option at the time.”

“But I don’t understand _why,_ Yuuri. Did you stop loving me?” Viktor rasps, the wool of Yuuri’s coat scratching his lips.

“No,” Yuuri shakes his head before leaning his cheek against Viktor’s head. “No, never. I didn’t lie about that. I’ve always loved you, Viten’ka. I’m sorry. I wish I could take it back.”

Viktor grabs Yuuri’s shoulders and pushes him back to look him fully in the face through wet eyes. It comes as a complete surprise when Yuuri’s face has also changed. The younger man has no tears of his own, but his features are warped, red, wet and puffy as if he’d been crying himself ugly for days.

“Take it back, then! Make them give your memories back!”

“I can’t,” Yuuri frowns. “That’s not how it works, you know that. It’s too late.”

Viktor is going to be sick. He curses loudly, a long string of Russian that would make even Yura blush. If only he hadn’t been so quick to follow Yuuri’s example. If only he’d forced himself to come out on the other side of his heartbreak, memories in tact. He could have found Yuuri again, even if he wasn’t “supposed” to. He could have shown Yuuri the evidence of everything he’d tried to forget. He could have fought harder. They could have fallen in love all over again. They could have found a way, maybe.

But he’d never tried. He’d let himself wallow in self-pity and found his solace in the bottoms of glasses and bottles. He’d felt rejected and betrayed and abandoned and had gotten so good at playing the role that he’d given up without a fight. Just like he’d done the first time they’d met and Yuuri had disappeared. He’d been too busy playing the victim, and now he was going to lose everything he had left of the man who had given him both life and love because he’d never _learned his fucking lesson_.

“I want to stop,” he says between strained breaths, a fresh round of tears beading on his bottom lashes. “Make them stop! I don’t want to do this anymore! I want to remember this, Yuuri!”

When Yuuri opens his mouth to answer, the sound of shattering glass interrupts him. Their heads snap to attention to see panels of glass cracking at the top of the greenhouse, bit by bit until they can’t hold themselves together any longer. They buckle and come crashing down into the plants, into the fountain with dramatic splashes, onto the concrete where they burst into a million pieces of starlight.

Yuuri looks concerned as the metal beams above them begin to groan under some unseen pressure. “It’s happening already.”

“What is?” Viktor asks, eyes flitting from spot to spot as pieces of the greenhouse rattle loudly against each other before they cave inward around them. The fountain breaks under overturned trees and steel bolts, and the square tiles that make up the pathway split and crack in zig-zag patterns like lightning.

“They found this place,” Yuuri says, his hands gripping back at Viktor’s elbows. “They’re erasing this memory.”

“Can we stop it?” Viktor panics, head swiveling for some solution, some way to keep the greenhouse from crumbling around them. “Can we go somewhere else? We could hide! A different memory, maybe?!”

Yuuri shakes his head. “This is it, Viten’ka. This is the last one. There’s nowhere else to go.”

“Yuuri, _please,”_ Viktor begs in a raspy whisper. “Stay with me. Don’t go.”

“I wish I hadn’t,” Yuuri grimaces.

“At least tell me why you did,” Viktor pleads.

Yuuri shakes his head no. Instead, the Japanese man cups Viktor’s face between his hands and brings it down into a kiss. It’s sweet and deep, and pregnant with remorse and pleasure and desire and joy and sorrow. Viktor sobs into it, pressing back until Yuuri’s glasses are shoved up the bridge of his nose and Viktor feels lightheaded from the lack of oxygen. The air that funnels in from the fresh holes in the greenhouse is colder than he remembers it being. Winds whip around them, licking at their wet cheeks and wafting their hair into each other’s eyes. Yuuri pulls back and rests his forehead against Viktor’s.

“I’ll find you,” Viktor promises weakly, though he isn’t sure how. How do you find someone you’re about to forget to remember?

With his eyes closed and a contented smile on his lips, Yuuri simply says, “I love you, Viten’ka.”

“I love you, too,” Viktor rasps.

From above, the sharp screeching sound of metal bending against itself draws their attention. Bolts rattle out of place and the whole beam dislodges with a loud snap. It’s hurtling down, down down, so fast, too fast.

“Yuuri!” Viktor screams, his fingers digging into Yuuri’s arms while he watches the beam speed toward them.

Yuuri leans in, calm, and whispers into Viktor’s ear. “I love it here. Take me to Tauride again someday, okay?”

Viktor has just enough to time to snap his clear blue eyes back to meet the warm brown ones that crinkle at the corners with the evidence of a truly loving smile.

The beam crushes them both. It doesn’t hurt.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Viktor’s life flashes before his eyes, and then he opens them.

His alarm clock is beeping five o’clock.

It’s Monday, his first day as a coach.

He feels remarkably well-rested.

* * *

 

Viktor can’t stop kissing Yuuri. He tastes simultaneously of sugar and spice, and his long lashes flutter so prettily with every brush of the lips. He kisses him once more in front of the bakery. He kisses him on the bus back to his apartment. He kisses his cheek on the elevator ride up after a quick stop at the bank of mailboxes in the lobby. When he closes the apartment door behind them, he turns around intending to kiss him again, but Yuuri beats him to the punch by stepping into his space and encircling Viktor’s neck with his arms. They aren’t hurried kisses, or even strikingly passionate. They’re shy and longing, like a teenager’s lovesick sigh.

“This is crazy. I never do─ I’ve never _done_ this,” Yuuri whispers after breaking away in the entryway. His entire face is flushed and the fog Viktor’s hot breath left on his lenses is fading.

Viktor smiles. “Me, either,” he says. “But I’m glad we are.”

Yuuri smiles with his teeth, though his eyes give away his nerves. Viktor moves back in to join their lips together once more, but Yuuri leans back and places a hand gently on Viktor’s chest. “C-can...Can I use your bathroom?” he asks. “Just for a minute.”

“Sorry,” Viktor coughs, taking one step backward. “Sorry, yeah. Of course. Um. It’s around the corner, through the bedroom. Here, let me take your bag.”

Yuuri nods and slips his rucksack from his shoulders before handing it over to the taller man. “Just... a minute,” he says again before turning and scurrying off.

Alone in the entryway and a bit dazed, Viktor swallows hard. He brought Yuuri home. Or rather, Yuuri had agreed to come home with him. But they hadn’t really specified what they were going to do now that they were here. Viktor had said it was just to talk, but they have been kissing each other like that and… It’s nice; Viktor isn’t complaining. But what is Yuuri thinking? Does he want to─

That’s getting ahead of himself. Viktor shakes his head, stray locks of hair that had already fallen out of the hair tie whipping into his eyes. He has to calm down. Be cool. Smooth. He sets Yuuri’s bag down next to the hall table and walks into the living room where he disrobes his coat and carefully drapes it over the back of the couch before sitting down. His posture is stiff and his heart is running a marathon in his chest. Still no Yuuri. Be cool, be cool. He should do something. Anything. He has to calm down. The mail! He can look through the mail.

Leaning back into the cushions, Viktor looks down at the stack in his hands. A bill sits on top, but it’s the small manila envelope that catches his attention first. He sets the rest aside and runs his eyes over his name and address, handwritten in cheap ballpoint pen. He doesn’t recognize the writing and there’s no return address on the front _or_ the back.

Sparing a glance toward his bedroom to check for his companion (and finding no sign of him), Viktor carefully rips the seam of the envelope’s flap and reaches in. Inside is a white CD, the kind he used to buy in bulk to store his skating music, in a clear, plastic case. His name is written on the CD in black marker, the same handwriting as the one on the envelope.

There’s also a tri-folded sheet of printer paper, the cheap, thin, off-white kind that people buy for home use. Setting the CD in his lap, Viktor lifts the unfolded letter to his eyes and reads the brief letter, a few short paragraphs composed in bold-typed English.

 

 

 

> **To all patients of Lacuna, Inc.,**
> 
> **We are members of an organization against the unethical practices and aims of Lacuna, Inc., a global conglomerate that you hired to erase part of your memory.**
> 
> **In recent months, we have gained access to the central bank of patient audio recordings and have decided to send all files back to former patients. We are not doing this for monetary gain or notoriety; we are acting on principle alone. We will not be making public any of these files or the names associated with them. Once we have completed our work, we will destroy the database where this information is stored so that you will have the only copy of your file.**
> 
> **It is our hope that you will understand the gravity of giving up the people, places, and experiences that make you who you are and will support grassroots efforts like ours to put a stop to Lacuna, Inc. and other corporations like it.**
> 
> **MEMENTO**

 

He re-reads it three times, just to try and wrap his head around the meaning. But he doesn’t _get_ it. What _is this?_ And why is his stomach doing flips suddenly?

“Viktor?”

The blue-eyed man snaps his head up to see Yuuri standing awkwardly to the side.

“Is everything okay?” Yuuri asks. “You look... pale. Should I go ba─”

“No!” Viktor says immediately, standing. The CD clatters to the floor. “I um... I was just reading my mail, and I got this... weird package.” He laughs awkwardly, forcing a smile onto his face.

Yuuri cocks his head to one side, not following.

“It says I hired some company to erase my memory,” Viktor explains uneasily before bending down to pick up the CD. “And this is my file or something.”

“That’s... scary,” Yuuri frowns, shifting from one leg to the other. “Maybe you shouldn’t...”

But Viktor is already moving, heading for the stereo that sits on a shelf of one of his many bookcases. It’s been unused for ages if the film of gray dust is any indication. He can’t help his curiosity. He _erased_ his memories? Erased. Forgot. Viktor has so many gaps, _so many,_ and he thought it was the alcohol. Everyone told him it was the alcohol. But this letter says otherwise. He _has_ to know. As soon as he’s turned the CD player on, he shoves the disc into the slot so fast that the machine doesn’t suck it inside until a beat later. He mashes the play button.

At first, there’s silence, and then a robotic voice reading out a seemingly random string of numbers and letters. Following that, a name Viktor doesn’t recognize, and then a run-time. More silence. Detached sounds. And then, “Come in,” and a one-sided conversation from an unfamiliar voice.

But then Viktor hears himself, his cadence, his inflections, the liquid way his native language rolls off his tongue in a way French and English don’t quite parallel. It’s unmistakably him. He stands there before the stereo, horrified, as he listens to himself and someone he doesn’t know talk about things like why this recording exists at all, and how safe his information is _._

( _Ha.)_

“Viktor?” Yuuri asks behind him but Viktor, focused on the exchange he’s listening to, doesn’t answer.

It’s a hoax. It has to be. Some weird joke. He’s about to turn the whole thing off when he hears the other man ask him to state his name and why he came. The finger hovering over the power button freezes just nanometers shy of contact.

_”My name is Viktor Nikiforov. I’m here to erase him.”_

_“My fiancé. Ex fiancé.”_

_“Yuuri Katsuki.”_

The air punches out of Viktor’s lungs. The whole recording is in Russian, but Yuuri’s name is clear as a bell, completely unmistakable. When he spins around to look at the man behind him, Yuuri’s eyes are wild and frightened, and he’s already backing away, step over step.

“Wh...What is this?” Yuuri asks slowly.

“I don’t know!” Viktor says defensively, both hands up submissively.

“Are you messing with me?”

“Huh? No! What? Why would I do that?!”

“I don’t... I don’t know! You said my name! On the recording, I mean,” Yuuri points out, his voice pitching higher. “Why did you say my name?”

Viktor’s mind races for some explanation, but he can’t think of anything that doesn’t sound crazier than the truth. So he goes with it. “It says... _I said,_ I wanted them to erase you. That you... you were my...”

“Your _what?”_ Yuuri asks, jaw tight.

“M-my fiancé.”

The smaller man balks at the title. “This is... Is this a joke? We barely know each other!”

“Yuuri...” Viktor says softly in an attempt to calm him even when he feels the exact opposite of calm himself.

“Is this why you invited me here? Shit. _Shit._ This isn’t funny, Viktor. It’s _not funny!_ ” Yuuri babbles shakily, panic firmly rooted in every word.

Viktor’s voice lilts out of the speakers still, talking now about living with Yuuri, training with Yuuri, competing with Yuuri, having _sex_ with Yuuri. The recorded Viktor accuses Yuuri of being a liar, of being cruel. The present Viktor briefly gives a moment of thanks that the man in his apartment can’t understand it.

“I know it’s not funny,” Viktor says, taking a step forward. “I don’t... I don’t know what this is.” Another step. “Yuuri, I─”

“No!” Yuuri yells sharply as he violently shakes his head. “Don’t... don’t come... I-I have to go!” He turns and runs for the door.

“Yuuri, wait!” Viktor shouts, his feet already carrying him after the Japanese man.

Yuuri glances over his shoulder and, seeing the tall Russian barreling at him only steps behind, shrieks something in Japanese and throws one arm back as if to take a swipe at the silver-haired man. He pays for his distraction, however, when he slams into the hall table and topples both it and himself to the ground.

“Yuuri!”

“No!” Yuuri yells again.

He’s up on his feet, ungracefully scrambling with just enough frame of mind to grab his bag while doing so. It takes just a moment, just a fleeting few seconds, before Yuuri flings open the door and launches himself through it. By the time Viktor vaults over the overturned table and yanks the door open, Yuuri isn’t even in the hall.

Viktor stands in the doorway, unable to move forward or backward. _“He was the love of my life,”_ he hears himself saying through the speakers. _“And then he just... left.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I want you to know that I wrote this chapter through ugly sobs. When I first starting planning this fic, the dream sequence was the first thing I drafted. It changed a bit as the other things took form, but it's the scene that meant the most to me. 
> 
> The engraving thing was sort of funny; I always intended for Yuuri to suggest having their rings engraved, and I decided to go with their names. But as I was writing, the thing about their canon snowflake engraving came out, so I had to figure out how to approach that. But I still wanted their names in the rings, so now they have both. 
> 
> (And did you spot that Stammi Vicino reference? I'm kind of proud of it. How about the fact that Yuuri says the same thing about the gardens as he did a few chapters ago? ITS ALL CONNECTED MY DUDES.)
> 
> Also, did you know that you really [can get married at the Tauride greenhouse?](https://www.google.co.jp/search?q=tauride+greenhouse+wedding&tbm=isch&tbs=rimg:CZBaV-KfNx4HIjj4o6X7HoRBXRa21mMOdrmZ8QGD_1PlkHSmFeHcAK-_1LUvZzore066z0L5tVtTdW8CN_1m8DPY1pV4ioSCfijpfsehEFdEXEdyZRBMVznKhIJFrbWYw52uZkRvFaNc4SVYrUqEgnxAYP8-WQdKRGn2C0gb8NYSioSCYV4dwAr78tSEal1w1Tv43TEKhIJ9nOit7TrrPQRalIWZO18L5UqEgkvm1W1N1bwIxGy_1W6UYFRBySoSCX-bwM9jWlXiEXEdyZRBMVzn&tbo=u&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjxwurqit7VAhVojVQKHZ4vDUgQ9C8IHw&biw=1463&bih=718&dpr=1.75) Because you can. 
> 
> **NEWS ABOUT THE END OF THIS FIC & SCHEDULING**  
> You may have noticed that this fic is now at 9 out of 11 chapters. It used to be 10 chapters, but as I was editing the final chapter, I realized the flow was kind of off. And since it was already double the length of the other chapters, I was considering splitting it into two. But as I was messing around with it, my word processor crashed and I lost the entire second half which was about 4.5k words! I was pretty upset... so upset that I never went to bed after that. Instead, I busted my butt and REWROTE ALL OF IT IN ONE DAY (and managed to make it even longer than it was????). 
> 
> So now it's going to be its own chapter for sure. Which means you still have two more to go. And also, because I will be getting on a series of planes, trains, and automobiles at the end of next week, the remaining two chapters will be coming out in rapid fire so I can wrap this up before I go MIA for a bit. Chapter 10 will be out this Saturday or Sunday, and the final chapter will be uploaded on Monday or Tuesday. 
> 
> Until then, come find me over on tumblr [@hanarezu-ni](http://hanarezu-ni.tumblr.com) for all the Victuuri you can handle.


	10. Circulus Vitiosus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _A vicious circle_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With the erasure of Viktor's last memory in the previous chapter, we've come to the end of timeline jumping. Enjoy the first part of the conclusion of _Yuuri Forgetting, by Viktor Forgot_.

He hadn’t cleaned up the overturned table. It had seemed unimportant. Viktor also hadn’t chased Yuuri. What good would it have done? They’d only just met. Or not, Viktor supposes, if the audio recording he spends all night playing on repeat over Chris’ bottle of tequila is to be believed.

And Viktor does believe it. He hadn’t, at first. But then he spends all evening trying to remember something even though every attempt is fruitless. There is no spark, no revelation of anything about Yuuri. Still, when he thinks about some of the gaps he’d told Yuuri about in the cafe, he is suddenly aware of a pattern, and he begins to remember vague things: a trip to some small town in Japan, standing in front of a church in Spain, a comforting hand when Makkachin had passed away. But it’s like trying to remember a dream years after he’d had it. The details are blurred and half-formed.

When he grabs his laptop to search for both his and Yuuri’s name together while drunkenly listening to the audio recording, he finds nothing. Later, in a bout of frustration, he tries again, this time from his phone, and he gets a hit. And then another. And another. Articles with pictures of him standing next to Yuuri (in one of _his_ costumes) on a podium in a small rink he didn’t quite recognize, of a kiss shared on the ice during a previous Grand Prix─ the one Viktor didn’t participate in because he’d taken the season off─, of him and Yuuri and a younger American skater flashing their trio of medals. Viktor’s arm is looped around the gold medalist, his eyes equal parts pride and disappointment.

He tries _harder_ to remember. He _does_. But it doesn’t make a difference. He remembers Skate America, he remembers the silver medal weighing down his neck. But whenever he turns his mind’s eye upward to see the man standing above him, he sees no one. Just a gold medal, disembodied and floating there as if by magic.

And then there’s the video tucked away on the twenty-first page of search results, on a sketchy website, of the man who hadn’t recognized Viktor’s face or name while sitting next to him on a bus but is on film soundlessly skating to Stammi Vicino, the program that won Viktor his fifth Worlds gold, the program that had meant so much to him (for reasons that are vague at best) that he’d resolved to take a season off after skating it.

He had known Yuuri. Had started and shared a life with him. And had then had that life unfairly ripped away from him, sending him into a spiral that ended only when he’d done the same. How tragic. How cruel.

But Yuuri doesn’t _seem_ cruel. He’d been a jolt that had woken Viktor up out of a long-suffered sleep. On the bus, in the greenhouse, at the cafe, Yuuri had been like a ray of light, shining and warm and comfortable. All the things opposite of how Viktor presently feels: dull, cold, and confused.

It’s all too much. He downs the rest of the tequila, turns off the stereo, and collapses into his bed.

* * *

 

In the morning, Viktor wakes up long after sunrise, and he _needs_ answers. But first, he needs to make the pounding in his head stop. Stumbling into the bathroom, Viktor turns on the faucet and cups water in his hands to bring to his mouth. When the liquid hits his tongue, he instantly feels like vomiting. Fucking tequila. Fucking Chris.

Medicine. He has some, he thinks, something he’d bought a long time ago when his drinking had been out of control and Yakov had railed against him for being so reckless. Something to help curb the hangover. But it’d already been a year, and where was it? He can’t remember where he’d tossed it. Hastily, Viktor through a drawer, then another, then drops down into a crouch to rummage through the forest of body creams, hair gels, and colognes in the cabinet under the sink.

He’s about to give up altogether when his hand brushes against a clear plastic sandwich bag, made opaque with time and humidity, shoved into the furthest corner behind a handful of products he’d purchased over the years and had then promptly forgotten. He grabs it, hoping it’s what he’s been searching for, and brings it out into the light to see a small black mass sitting in the bottom. His head zings; with a wince, Viktor carefully separates the top and pulls the bag open.

Inside are two small, black velvet bags and a scrap of paper with a message hastily scribbled in French:

 

_I hope you’ll forgive me for not getting rid of these as you asked, chéri. I couldn’t bear to do it. Some things are meant to be cherished, no matter how painful. I hope that when you find these, you’ll understand._

_XO_

_Christophe_

 

Viktor’s brows knit together. Get rid of what? What had he wanted Viktor to cherish? Viktor can’t remember asking Chris to dispose of anything. Setting aside the note, he removes one of the pouches from the plastic bag and carefully loosens the drawstring to allow whatever is inside to tumble out.

A golden band. Simple on the outside. Elegant. Viktor turns the ring in his fingers and catches an engraving on the inside. At the edge, half a snowflake accompanied by a smaller, whole one. He rotates it again and catches his name, stamped into the metal in Cyrillic. He blinks dumbly as he slips the ring onto his right fourth finger. It’s too small.

When he removes the other pouch from the plastic bag and tips its contents into his hand in the same fashion, he’s surprised to see an identical ring, though slightly larger than the first. The inside is engraved with the same half snowflake, a mirror image of the one on the first ring, and another small one beside it. When he turns the golden circle in his hand, he sees the unfamiliar etching.

勇利

Viktor’s stomach sinks. He can’t read it, but he can narrow down which language it comes from and make a good guess as to what it probably says. With one ring still on stuck on his finger and the other in his hand, Viktor rushes to the kitchen where he’d left his phone and opens up his translating app to clumsily draw the characters as best he can. When he presses the TRANSLATE button, his suspicions are confirmed.

“Yuuri,” he breathes.

And then the tears come. They spring up from deep, ancient places and he’s not sure they’ll ever stop.

( _Fucking Chris.)_

* * *

 

By noon, Viktor manages to stave off the sobs and make himself at least somewhat presentable. He regrets not having cleaned up when he has to clamors over the side table to get out the door, but he doesn’t have time to fix it now. He _needs_ to get to the rink. Viktor checks his phone as the elevator descends to street level. Yakov had called a few times but had seemingly given up in the early evening. There are a few from Yuri as well, time-stamped from this morning. The first is an expletive-laden demand to know why he’s late even though he took the “ _whole fucking day”_ off yesterday. Then another equally vulgar threat to switch coaches if he doesn’t show before the hour’s up. The third one, though, breaks with the tone of its predecessors.

_< <Actually, maybe it’s best if you don’t come. You seem like you need a break. I’m not mad, OK? Just get some rest. Yakov will understand.>>_

Viktor frowns as he pockets the phone when the elevator doors open.

For the second day in a row, Viktor rides an unfamiliar bus. This time, though, it’s only the timing that is unfamiliar. The route is the same one he takes to the rink on typical mornings. But there are no cute Japanese men to talk to, so Viktor tries typing out a message to Yuuri using the email he’d saved when he’d sent himself the photos from Yuuri’s phone.

_< <Hi, it’s Viktor. I don’t know what to say about yesterday, but I think we need to talk. I want to see you, but I understand if you’re hesitant. I’m coming to the rink today. I hope you’ll be there with your skater.>>_

When the bus arrives, Viktor runs despite his headache and the way jostling his body like this threatens to bring all that tequila right back up. But he has to get inside. He has to find─

Minami.

He thinks that’s the kid’s name, the one Yuuri had mentioned. He’s not actually a kid; he looks to be around the same age as Yuri, judging from his height as he stands next to the blonde Russian and speaks with a serious expression while other young guest athletes zip around them. It _has_ to be him because when he glances over Viktor’s way by coincidence, his face falls.

“Viktor!” Yuri spits upon following the young Japanese skater’s gaze. “I said you didn’t have to come.”

“You. Come here,” Viktor calls, pointing to the young man with the wild hair.

The young man swallows hard and nods, kicking one blade to the ice to take off into a slow glide toward Viktor. “Hi,” he says awkwardly when he reaches the half wall.

“You’re Yuuri’s student, right?”

“Um,” the younger man says, scratching the back of his head. He refuses to make eye contact.

Viktor’s forehead creases as he furrows his brows. “Do you know me?”

The Japanese teen runs his tongue over his teeth. “Every skater knows _you,_ ” he points out.

“That’s not what I meant,” Viktor says. “Have we met before?”

Minami glances over his shoulder at Yuri who manages only to stare back at them both, green eyes wide and mouth slightly ajar. It’s all the answer Viktor needs. His hands find their way into his barely-combed hair where they tug at the roots in short, sharp yanks.

“God, what _is_ this?” he mutters to himself. “What the hell _is_ this? I don’t remember anything!”

A heavy hand falls on his shoulder. “Vitya.”

Viktor turns to his former coach who looks tired. _So_ tired.

“Yakov,” Viktor says, grabbing his hand roughly. Yakov flinches. “Yakov, I met Yuuri.”

The old man’s body goes limp with a derisive sigh, and it hits Viktor like a ton of bricks, the _recognition_ in Yakov’s nonverbal cues. The innate _understanding_ of what is happening even though Viktor himself has no comprehensive idea. Through thick lashes, the veteran coach eyes the young Japanese skater who immediately straightens his back.

“So I heard,” Yakov says.

“I’m sorry!” Minami blurts. “I...I knew it might be risky to bring him with me! I figured you’d be here, so I told him not to come to the rink! Not until I could check with Coach Feltsman and make sure it was safe!”

Yakov grumbles to himself (and then shouts at a still-gaping Yuri to stop being a fucking statue and show the other camp participants the pointers of his Salchow or something). Viktor is frozen in place; he feels like he’s standing in the ocean where waves crash into him and the only thing he can do is take the battering.

“It was an accident! I didn’t think... it’s a big city! I knew what happened to him, but I was so nervous to come on my own, and when I told him it was in Saint Petersburg, he said he _wanted_ to come... It was stupid, I know. I know! His family tried to talk him out of it, but they couldn’t do it without telling him _why,_ ” the Japanese skater continues, his accent getting thicker the more panicked he becomes. “I never thought in a million years you’d run into each other randomly!”

Viktor turns to his former coach, eyes wide. “Yakov?”

“I didn’t know Katsuki was his coach,” Yakov says. “I only found out yesterday after introductions and he asked me about letting Katsuki come observe. That’s when I called you.”

“I’m _so_ sorry!” Minami says again quickly. “It’s all my fault.”

“Where is Yuuri?” Viktor finally asks, blue eyes boring holes in Minami. “I need to see him.”

“He... he left this morning. He told me about... you. And the CD. He was really upset and said he couldn’t stay,” the flashy youth says, eyes cast downward while he picks at his nails. “He took the first flight back to Japan.”

The bitter sound of Viktor’s laugh puts everyone in the rink on edge; heads swivel to watch him take a nosedive into mania. Yuuri left unannounced. It seemed he was good at that. It’d be more devastating if Viktor could remember the first time it’d happened. Instead, it just feels like a story someone once told him before bed. A stupid little story with a played-out plot that Viktor can’t remember starring in.

Viktor hates this story. But he's going to have to listen anyway.

* * *

 

With the exception of Minami, Yakov sends the temporary students to Lilia for the morning and calls a meeting of everyone on his team. They shuffle into the break room and close the door, circling chairs around to face Viktor.

Yakov tells him everything he knows because, he says, there’s nothing else to do in this case. The others pitch in where they can when Yakov demands it. They cobble together nearly three years of memories, of _life._ A banquet in Sochi, a longing, a viral video, an impromptu extended stay in Japan complete with a seat-of-the-pants exhibition show, a revitalization, a _partnership._ They use words like “adorable” (Milla), “soulmates” (Georgi), “power couple” (some of the younger skaters), “gross” (Yuri), and “a pain in the ass, the both of you” (Yakov).

Still, no one can tell him definitively why Yuuri left because all anyone else has are facts, personal opinions, and observations of their public selves. No one knows what happened when they went home. And then the conversation drifts on to how bad Viktor had gotten when Yuuri was gone, how far he’d fallen, how he had decided to follow Yuuri’s example and go to Lacuna (a topic Yuri Plisetsky stays silent for, despite the guilt in his eyes), and the plan they’d rigged to protect him afterward.

It’s dizzying, learning years of his life in the span of an hour or two. Minami fidgets the entire time, the wetness in his eyes turning his freshly sharpened features back in time to round, doughy shapes that make him look like a lost child. When Viktor has finally had more than he can take, he stands abruptly, letting the chair clatter to its side with the force of his motion. Everyone in the room stills, eyes on him like they’re waiting to see what a cornered wild animal will do next.

“Vitya,” Yakov warns. “Katsuki made his decision, and you made yours. This shouldn’t have happened, you finding out. And I’m sorry for that. I was supposed to protect you, and I take responsibility... if only I’d vetted the enrollment roster better.” He casts a glance over to the young Japanese skater who quivers under his gaze. “But what’s done is done. Don’t go chasing after him again.”

 _Again_ is a concept Viktor can’t comprehend right now. He trembles at the thought. “I need to go,” Viktor croaks, swaying where he stands.

“Vitya. Don’t be stupid.”

“ _Home,_ ” Viktor clarifies. “I need to go _home.”_

And then he turns and stumbles out the door to do just that, and no one calls after him. It’s just as well. What could they say to make this better? To make it easier?

Maybe only Yuuri could do that. But he’s gone.

Again.

“Oh,” Viktor says aloud, staggering to a stop just outside the arena. So he does have a concept of _again_ after all.

* * *

 

Viktor stands in the center of his apartment and turns circles, trying to imagine Yuuri’s presence in every nook and cranny. How had they been when they were together? Did they laugh often? Was Yuuri a messy person? Did he leave his socks on the floor for Viktor to pick up later, or was it the other way around? Had Makkachin loved him? Who did the cooking? What was his favorite color? Did he know Viktor’s?

He doesn’t _know._ And that tears holes in him. He feels hollow and cold and so _empty._ And he needs a drink.

But he doesn’t head for the kitchen because while everyone was piecing together Viktor’s forgotten life, he’d heard more than a handful of mentions about the way he’d tried to let alcohol fill the void Yuuri left. His face had twisted uncomfortably at each mention of a bile-stained shirt, the sharp smell it left on him, the number of times Yakov or Yuri had pulled him off a bar top or from the floor. They said that after the procedure, he'd gotten better. It was true that he enjoyed a drink now and again, and sometimes he’d let himself have just a bit too much. But it wasn’t a common thing, not like it apparently had been.

Still, between hearing everyone else’s stories and the lingering tequila-induced headache, he worries that he might fall back into a habit he didn’t know he’d developed. He doesn’t want to be _that_ person anymore (again?). Yakov was right. Viktor had made his choices, and they’d been stupid. Immature. Self-destructive. But that didn’t mean he had to _keep_ making those choices. Those kinds of choices hadn’t fixed anything. They hadn’t patched up the holes he was currently rediscovering.

So no, he has to be done with that. He can’t... won’t... take the edge of his nervous energy with liquor; there has to be some other way to shake off this nagging weight on his shoulders and void in his chest. He chooses to sleep. And for three days, he does, with his phone off. He ignores the periodic banging on his door and leaves his room only when necessary and just long enough to use the bathroom, drink some water, and scrounge for any food item he can bring into bed with him.

On the third day, he manages to pull himself out of bed and wash the grease from his skin and hair, and then Viktor begins to aggressively clean his apartment.

* * *

 

“─after a group of hackers known as MEMENTO covertly broke into the private server of global mega-corporation Lacuna Incorporated earlier this year. This morning, the group posted a video link on their Twitter account which features an audio recording of an anonymous member of the self-proclaimed hacktivist organization speaking about the release of hundreds of thousands of digital recordings back to former Lacuna clients early last week. The unidentified speaker blasts the corporation for─”

The television is mostly on for noise, to give Viktor something to focus on rather than his own thoughts. He’s not listening to the words, exactly, but it helps him get through decluttering the bookcases and finally dusting the shelves, and it makes moving the living room furniture around to properly vacuum the floors less of a bore. He’s tired, but it feels... normal. Productive. Not the kind of tired that comes after downing half a bottle or more.

Now, he makes his way toward his front door to deal with the hall table that is still tipped on its side among a littering of other items. First thing, he needs to upright the table itself. It’s a solid piece of furniture, all wood and brass with panels on all four sides in lieu of legs. As he readies himself to lift it from the floor, he thinks better and heads back into the living room to grab a cloth and cleaner. The baseboards could use a wipe down, judging by the balls of house dust that roll around when he squats down. As he wipes, he notices a corner of yellowed paper sticking out between the floor and the overturned table.

With a cocked brow, Viktor pulls it out and blows on it, sending a spray of dust flying. It’s a nondescript envelope, plain and unassuming. His name and address are printed on a label in standard type, but there’s no return address. He turns it over to look at the backside, but it also comes up blank. Viktor flips it back to the front and inspects the postmark, a faded red stamp that reads DETROIT, U.S.A.

Viktor frowns. Sitting back on his haunches, he tears into the envelope to find a pristine piece of white cardstock printed in blocky, black English:

 

** Lacuna, Inc. **

 

**Dear Mr. VIKTOR NIKIFOROV,**

 

**This message is to inform you that**

**YUURI KATSUKI**

**has erased you from his memory.**

**Please make no further attempts to contact**

**YUURI KATSUKI.**

 

 

At first, Viktor just sees the words as meaningless pictographs. He’d heard about the postcards everyone had received after Yuuri had flown off to Japan, never to return. Was this Viktor’s? But that didn’t make sense. Viktor had (according to everyone else) _seen_ the postcard. It’s what had set everything into motion. So how could it have been in a sealed envelope still? His eyes slide back to the postmark on the envelope and search out the date. In the middle of the stamp, he finds it. Mid-December, three years prior.

It throws him. The timeline he’d pieced together from everyone’s stories had Yuuri leaving a year and a half ago, but this postcard was sent long before that. December, three years ago... what had he been doing? He thinks hard, feels the edges of holes in his mind as he goes backward in time. And then he finds it.

 _Sochi._ The last Grand Prix Final he’d medaled in. The place where (according to a spiteful Yuri Plisetsky) he’d first laid eyes on Yuuri Katsuki. The place they had reportedly danced together for the first time.

Yuri had mentioned that Yuuri had been so drunk that night he hadn’t really remembered his first meeting with Viktor. That in Yuuri’s mind, Viktor’s appearance in Japan had come out of nowhere. That it’d been sort of a running joke between them once Yuuri found out. But this wasn’t funny. Because this postcard made it clear that, just like Viktor, it wasn’t the alcohol that had caused a lapse in Yuuri’s memory. Yuuri had forgotten him on purpose.

_Twice._

And all Viktor can do is laugh. He laughs so hard it hurts his sides. He laughs until his chest burns with the need to gasp for air. Because what else can he do? It seems Viktor has been repeatedly chasing a man who didn’t want to be found.

Viktor knows he may be a bit dense sometimes, but he also knows when to give up.

So he does.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maybe you were wondering why I jumped so far back a few chapters ago with Viktor gushing to Makka about his encounter with Yuuri at the Sochi banquet... and now you know why. They've been playing this game over and over... Viktor just didn't realize it. 
> 
> Also, if you really pay attention to that scene with Makkachin a few chapters back, you'll see the exact moment when Viktor missed this initial post-Sochi notice. ;)
> 
> Final chapter will be up on Monday. See you then. 
> 
> [@hanarezu-ni](http://hanarezu-ni.tumblr.com) on tumblr


	11. Dum Spiro Spero

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _As long as I breathe, I hope_

“I can’t believe it’s already been a month since all of that,” Chris says through the phone that Viktor has cradled between his shoulder and his ear.

“Five weeks,” Viktor corrects the Swiss man flatly as he dries the last dish in the rack and places it back in the cupboard.

There’s a short pause, one in which Viktor can almost hear his friend frowning, before Chris says, “Are you still mad about the rings? I _swear_ I didn’t think you’d actually go through with the procedure, _chéri_. I thought it was just the heartbreak talking and that you’d regret it.”

“It’s not that I was mad, really,” Viktor starts. “I mean, I don’t remember asking you to get rid of them, obviously. And I know you meant well. So...” he trails off, noncommittal.

Chris hums a response.

“Anyway, I’ve been trying to just... move on. He never contacted me after that, you know? For all I know, he had all of it erased again. And I’ve been keeping myself busy with getting Yura ready for the upcoming season. So it’s not like I’m obsessing over it or anything.”

“It does seem you’ve been doing pretty well, all things considered. Taking care of yourself a bit more,” Chris notes. “I’m glad.”

“I’m trying to learn from my mistakes,” Viktor says.

“Admirable,” Chris praises. “And you’re still thinking of coming to visit me for a little vacation? I think it’s a wonderful idea, by the way!”

Viktor opens his mouth to speak, but he’s cut off by the chime of his doorbell. “Oh. I’ll have to email you the details later, Chris. Someone’s at the door.”

“All right, _chéri._ Have a pleasant night,” Chris chirps into the phone.

The bell chimes a second time, prompting Viktor to turn and head in the direction of the door. “You too,” he says to Chris quickly before adding his goodbye. He ends the call and yells “Coming!” in Russian to the persistent bell-ringer.

After placing his phone on the hall table, he grumbles as he undoes the lock and pulls open the door. It’s already evening and he wasn’t expecting anyone. A salesman? Or maybe a neighbor. He takes a deep breath and tacks on his practiced smile, but he is completely unprepared for the way time and space seem to freeze once he comes face to face with his uninvited visitor.

Yuuri stands in the hall, dark hair glowing in the warm light of the halogen lamps that line the hall. His brown eyes are locked onto Viktor, and his jaw is set tight... determined. They stare at each other for what seems like a number of eternities before time unpauses itself and Viktor manages to squeeze out a bewildered “Hi?” before his chest constricts so hard he has a tough time taking the next breath.

“Can I come in?” Yuuri asks, simply, eyes locked onto Viktor’s face.

It’s like he’s on autopilot; Viktor’s heart is racing, but his body moves on its own, completely ignoring the fact that he should be feeling one of a million different things: anger, hurt, pettiness, desperation? But he just feels... dazed. He wets his lips and moves to the side, holding the door open to allow Yuuri to pass over the threshold. As he shuts the door behind him, Viktor scrambles for what to say next and eventually settles on, “What brings you here? Sight-seeing again?” in something resembling a tease. He immediately yells at himself internally for trying to make small talk, for trying to make this seem normal. He sounds stupid, and he knows it.

Yuuri turns to face Viktor head-on a second time. “I came to see you.”

“Me? From _Japan?”_ Viktor blinks. “You... flew from Japan, unannounced, to see _me?”_

Yuuri doesn’t answer the question directly. Shifting to dig into the messenger bag slung across his chest, he produces a white CD in a clear case. YUURI KATSUKI is written in thick, black letters made with a permanent marker. “I have something you need to hear,” he says. “Can I use your stereo?”

Again, Viktor can’t find the right words to say (even though a simple “Yes” or “No” would do), but it doesn’t seem to matter. Yuuri is already moving into the living room and toward the stereo. Viktor follows behind him dumbly and watches the Japanese man jab buttons until the machine comes to life. When Yuuri presses the eject button, Viktor flinches. The CD bearing his own name slides out; Yuuri pauses for a just a beat before setting it aside and inserting his own.

At first, there is silence, then a click. A woman’s voice cuts in, monotone and sharp, followed by the quieter, softer voice of a man. The first few exchanges come and go; Yuuri stays in place with his back to Viktor, apparently listening. After another back and forth between the two speakers, Viktor hears the man clearly say, “Katsuki Yuuri.” And after another few comments, he hears his own name drift through the speakers, extra syllables added in the same way Japanese commentators used to say it when he was a competitor. Suddenly, the recorded Yuuri is speaking faster, with more inflection, and Viktor’s name comes up in every other sentence.

“I’m saying...” Yuuri begins without turning to face the Russian, “I’m saying that we brought out the worst in each other.”

Viktor’s mouth goes dry. Slowly, he creeps toward the couch and lowers himself down on one side, keeping his eyes on Yuuri’s tense back.

A sharp inhale and Yuuri continues. “I’m saying that you changed.” Then he pauses and lets the recording fill the silence before he starts speaking again. “At first... you were distracted because I was here, but that wasn’t really a big deal, I thought. Then...Makkachin?... died. Your dog. And you were very sad, and so was I. And that made things a little harder. You couldn’t concentrate.”

Another pause to listen before translating the next few lines.

“You didn’t do well at Skate America and after that, you were... out of control. You threw yourself into practice, but it was too much. You were like a demon... obsessed, angry, and you didn’t listen to anyone.”

Viktor can’t help the bitter chuckle that escapes his lips. “Sounds like me.”

At that, Yuuri finally turns around. His eyes are softer as he approaches the couch and sits on the opposite end. As he starts to talk again, Viktor notices that he gradually stops taking pauses to translate word for word. Instead, he’s telling a story that he’s memorized, as if he’d listened to the recording hundreds of times.

“At first, I wondered if it was my fault that you were having a hard time. You were coaching me and trying to work on your own routines and you didn’t have enough time for yourself. We started fighting a lot... you were always at the rink, we never went anywhere or really spent time together when we weren’t practicing.”

Viktor looks down; there’s a sense of guilt even if he can’t remember because he’s _sure_ if he and Yuuri were together, he’d be glued to the man. He’s want to be by his side, always.

“But then you got injured, and you still wouldn’t slow down. You even lied to me about it. I said I felt like... I didn’t know you anymore. You were this whole other person, this person I didn’t _like,_ and I thought that... _I_ helped create that person. I didn’t know how to support you... when the dog died, or when you were struggling in competitions. And you just...”

“...became a monster,” Viktor guesses.

Yuuri grimaces.

“I don’t know what to say, Yuuri. I don’t remember,” Viktor says, after which he chides himself for stating something so obvious. But Yuuri nods anyway.

“It wasn’t just about who you became, though. I didn’t like who I was becoming either.”

“You?”

The Japanese man nods again, his gaze sliding down to his feet.

“I told the lady in the recording that I was having panic attacks a lot. That I thought, with you, they’d get better, but they actually got worse because seeing you struggle like that and not knowing how to help you made me feel terrible. The fighting didn’t help. But I didn’t want to add to your stress, so I never told you about them.” He laughs drily at that. “And if I wasn’t panicking, I was annoyed or frustrated. I told her you called me a nag once, and I had hated it then but that it was probably true. I said it was all just too much for me. The dog dying, seeing you hurt yourself over and over again, watching you become so angry and unhappy and knowing it was _my fault...”_

Viktor sits up straighter, eyes wide, and interrupts. “Wait. Why would you think any of that was your fault?”

Yuuri’s brown eyes float back up to meet Viktor’s stare. “Because you told me it was,” he says softly.

Knots twist Viktor’s stomach into a heavy mass that sinks to the lowest points of his body. The notion that maybe Viktor had brought this on himself makes him sick to the point of tasting copper in his mouth. But no, that’s not right. Because even if he _had_ said something so awful, it didn’t mean Yuuri had to go as far as _erasing_ him.

“Still,” Viktor frowns, “why do _all this?”_ he asks, waving a hand in the air as if to motion toward the sound waves caused by Yuuri’s voice floating through the air as he tells his story to the woman who interjects from time to time.

Yuuri gives him a solemn half-smile and parrots Viktor’s own words by saying with a defeated shrug, “I don’t remember.”

Slumping back into the cushions of the couch, Viktor rubs his face roughly before letting his hands drop down into his lap. Yuuri shifts uncomfortably while fidgeting with the buttons of that run down the center of his shirt.

“I don’t remember,” Yuuri repeats slowly, “but maybe I thought that if I left, you’d get better. Wouldn’t feel so burdened. Would have time to concentrate without me around. Would be better off without someone complaining and nagging and panicking all the time. And maybe as long as you got better, that’d be enough for me.” He sucked in a breath and expels it slowly. “At least, that’d be my guess. It seems like something I’d think, anyway.”

Viktor takes in Yuuri’s face for a moment: his big eyes behind blue frames, his thick eyebrows, the fullness of his lips even as they are held so stiffly. A tired sigh worms its way out of his mouth as he tips his head back onto the couch before closing his eyes. “That’s stupid,” he huffs.

This time, when Yuuri chuckles, he _really chuckles_. “Yeah,” he says, “It is.”

They both fall into silence, letting the recording of Yuuri and the unknown woman fill the air around them until Yuuri suddenly says,“I-I think... I think I really loved you.”

Even though there is nothing especially romantic in Yuuri’s factual tone or the current posture of his body, Viktor finds himself blushing deeply. Yuuri glances up at him, just briefly, and his face too is overrun with a matching shade of red.

“I can’t really speak for the me that erased you,” Yuuri continues after a hard swallow, “but I know myself pretty well, and I’m... I’m not a strong person. Mentally, I mean. I probably didn’t think I’d be able to live with what I’d done, even if I thought it was best. Leaving someone I loved? On purpose? How could I handle that forever? I’d probably give in at the first opportunity and come running back, and then what would have been the point? So I took away the possibility completely.”

Viktor says nothing, but his eyes are wide open again, staring at the other man’s downturned face.

“At least... that’s what I think,” Yuuri adds as he picks at his fingernails. “I didn’t really mention it on the CD at all, but if I think about doing something like that _now_...”

Viktor waits, allowing Yuuri the chance to continue if he wishes. Part of him thinks he should be angry with the Japanese man. He should be shouting. But when he looks at Yuuri, silent on the other end of the couch, he only feels _soft. Remorseful,_ even. And loved. Viktor feels _loved,_ as ridiculous as it sounds, and he wonders how his previous self could have overlooked Yuuri’s pain so easily if that was in fact what he’d done. His previous self must have been stupid, or blind. If he only he could go back and tell himself to pay attention. If only...

He cuts himself off from that line of thought; it does him no good now. There’s no going back. And Viktor still has so many questions, though he knows Yuuri won’t really be able to answer them. But there is _one_ thing he needs to ask.

He rights himself and turns his body toward Yuuri. “You have a second CD, don’t you?”

At that, Yuuri’s shoulders go stiff. He chews on his bottom lip and nods slowly. “It seems we met before you came to Japan. We danced.”

“So I heard,” Viktor says.

“And I had that one night erased.”

Ignoring the sensation of being punched in the gut, Viktor wets his lips and asks, “Why?

“I said...I said that, um, I looked up to you. Admired you. A _lot._ A…. crush. Probably. But.... I w-was really drunk and I made a fool out of myself. I was embarrassed and didn’t want to remember what I’d done. How stupid I’d acted in front of my idol.” His cheeks are blazing as he swallows; his Adam's apple bobs dramatically before he continues. “We barely knew each other and I didn’t think you’d remember some idiot who flirted with you once at a party, so I figured no harm done.”

Viktor finds himself leaning in slightly like he’s being pulled toward Yuuri. He hears Yuuri speak, but it honestly doesn’t matter because the flush on Yuuri’s cheeks tells him more than the explanation can... and it’s _so_ enticing.

“But there _was_ harm done,” he says, voice deep. “My sources tell me I was very taken with that idiot. That I pined for him for an annoyingly long time.”

Yuuri looks up, his eyes large saucers as Viktor continues to close the gap between them.

“And I think I’m taken with this idiot, too,” the Russian murmurs as he places a tentative hand on Yuuri’s knee.

“Viktor,” Yuuri breathes shakily, placing a hand on his chest to bring his advancing to a halt. “Stop.”

“Why?” Viktor asks.

“I...I like you,” Yuuri stammers. “I do. Being with you... it was nice. I had fun. It felt natural. Talking with you, walking around with you...”

“Kissing me,” Viktor reminds him.

Yuuri flushes again but nods slowly. “But I did something awful to you. You should hate me.”

Viktor locks eyes with Yuuri and sighs. “Yuuri,” he grimaces, “...what we’ve done to _each other_ is awful, yes. But we aren’t those people anymore. And we can’t remember, so we _can’t_ be them anymore. It’s like we’re brand new versions of ourselves, don’t you think? We have a chance to start all over. Be better.”

Yuuri only cants his head to one side, his eyebrows tweaked with doubt.

“And the new me... he can’t help how he felt... _feels_ about the new you,” Viktor says earnestly. “I _can’t_ hate you.”

“But what if we make the same mistakes?” Yuuri whispers, concern lacing his words even though his shoulders slack ever so slightly. “What if we end up just doing it all over again?”

“We won’t,” Viktor replies, resuming his lean inward.

“We might,” Yuuri insists. “You might resent me. I might run away again because apparently, that’s _my thing._ And we might not talk to each other because it seems like we never did when it was really important. It wouldn't be any different!”

“So we’ll talk,” Viktor says, pressing his fingertips into Yuuri’s denim-covered knee. “We’re talking now. You flew all the way from Japan _just to talk._ Yuuri, _you came back_ this time _. You_ found _me_. It’s _already_ different.”

With that, Viktor snuffs out the last bit of distance between them and brushes his lips over Yuuri’s, soft at first to test the other man’s reaction. Yuuri isn’t in any rush to press back fully, but Viktor is pleased to feel those full lips move and pucker slightly under his own. He grips the back of the couch behind Yuuri’s head and brings his other hand from a bent knee to a bent elbow. Pulling Yuuri in, Viktor presses in, eager to deepen the kiss. At first, Yuuri seems willing... pliant, even.... until the last possible moment, when he backs away and clears his throat.

Viktor hangs his head for a moment and suppresses the frustrated sigh that threatens to bubble out; instead, he works on getting his breathing into a stable rhythm.

“Viktor,” Yuuri ventures.

“Y-yes?” He sits back and runs a hand through his hair to push it back and away from his face.

“I want you to know what I said on the recording,” Yuuri says.

“Huh? You’ve been telling me, haven’t you?” Viktor asks, frowning.

Yuuri shakes his head. “I paraphrased. I want you to know what I said, word for word. About you. About me. About _us_.” He turns to the bag still strapped across his body and pulls a thick manila file from the compartment at his hip. When he holds it out to Viktor, the Russian takes it without letting his eyes leave Yuuri’s face.

“I um... I translated it into English. The whole thing. The second CD, too. Please, Viktor? Please read it.”

“Yuuri,” Viktor drawls, sparing a single uncertain glance down to the stack of paper in his hands, “Whatever you said... it doesn’t matter anymore.”

“It _does_ matter,” Yuuri shoots back sharply. And then, softer, he says, “To me. It matters to me. If we... if we end up deciding to um... try again? Or whatever. I don’t know. I want you to know exactly what kinds of things go on in my head. I want you to know who I was. Who I _am_. I owe you that much.” Viktor runs a tongue over a canine tooth in thought before Yuuri adds, “I’ve hurt you enough. I don’t want to you hurt you anymore.”

Pressing his lips together, Viktor looks back down at the folder and thumbs haphazardly through the top pages. There must be at least a hundred pages, a number that leaves Viktor in awe if he’s being honest. He’d thought about asking why Yuuri hadn’t contacted him sooner, but the reason is right here, weighty in his hands.

Grimacing, he glances back up at Yuuri. “ _Now?”_

“Now,” Yuuri confirms.

* * *

 

By the time Viktor sets aside the last page, the evening is on the verge of turning into the next day. Yuuri sits tucked into the corner of the sofa, legs curled under him in a charmingly familiar pose like this has always been his spot. In his hands, he cradles a half-finished cup of once-hot tea that Viktor had poured for him during a short reading break. Yuuri’s eyes had barely left the Russian as he was reading, and Viktor is acutely aware of how closely Yuuri had been watching his face for reactions. Whenever Viktor’s mouth had twitched or he’d winced after reading a particularly rough piece of information, Yuuri had shifted his weight and clenched his jaw. He still feels the Japanese man’s eyes on him now.

Viktor leans back into the couch, tilting his chin up with a tired sigh. He runs a hand roughly down his face before staring up at the light fixtures suspended from the ceiling. “Wow,” is all he can manage to say.

“Yeah,” is Yuuri’s only reply.

“It takes a lot out of you when you have to read about all of your bad points,” Viktor titters bitterly.

Yuuri flinches at first, then blows into the mug as if the remaining tea is still as hot as it was when Viktor had taken it off the stove over an hour ago. “Sorry,” the Japanese man mumbles into his the mug.

“No,” Viktor says, turning his head to look at Yuuri. “Don’t apologize. You were right. I needed to know.”

Yuuri half-smiles, a sad little concession, and brings the mug to his lips to wet them. “Maybe... you should translate your too,” he offers after swallowing. “So I can read it. It’s not fair if it’s just you...”

Viktor sits up and squares his shoulders before turning his body toward the other man. “There’s no point,” he says sincerely. “Everything I said, I said because I was angry and hurt at what you’d done. But I... I obviously didn’t know how you were feeling, and I guess I never really took the time to find out. I didn’t take care of you, Yuuri. And maybe it’s too late, or maybe it doesn’t really mean anything since we can’t remember any of it, but I’m _so sorry_. I wish I could take it back.”

It’s sort of magical, the way Yuuri’s face transforms from something small and timid into the actual sun. He smiles shyly, but it’s so sincere and it’s like just the act of smiling brings a glow to his skin. And when he reaches out to curl a hand over one of Viktor’s own, warmth snakes its way into every part of Viktor’s body, soothing the sting of harsh words and harsher truths typed onto a hundred sheets of paper. “I’m sorry too, Viktor,” he replies.

Tentatively, Viktor repositions their hands so that they're clasped together rather than just one overlapping another. “So,” he asks, fighting down the heat in his cheeks, “What now?”

“Now...,” Yuuri trails for a moment, his eyes floating down to their clasped hands as he considers the question. “Now we get to know each other again, I guess. And see where that takes us?”

It’s not a grand romantic gesture or some dramatic confession, but it’s _exciting_. It makes Viktor buzz, makes his chest clench, releases butterflies in his stomach, and it adds extra width to his smile until it overtakes his face. “Okay,” he agrees.

“Okay,” Yuuri repeats, squeezing the Russian’s hand lightly.

For an extended pause, the two men sit and stare at each other, taking in every inch of one another’s faces. Every muscle twitch, every crease and dip. Before long, they’re wearing matching dopey grins and similar stains of red decorate their cheeks. Finally, Viktor slips his hand out of Yuuri’s and stands, desperate for a little reprieve from the charged air.

“I think we should have a drink,” he declares.

Yuuri frowns. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” he asks. “Before you said... about the alcohol and your gaps...” And then he snaps his mouth shut, having obviously come to the realization that the gaps weren’t necessarily _all_ about the liquor.

“It’s fine,” Viktor reassures. “I don’t really go wild like that anymore. Especially after you ran out of here.” He grimaces at the memory or Yuuri dashing toward the door. “Just have one with me. It’s been a weird day. We deserve a drink.”

Yuuri nods slightly. “Alright. But really, just one. I’m not very good at holding my liquor.”

“Good to know,” Viktor teases as he turns and heads toward the kitchen.

Pulling open the designated cabinet door, Viktor brings bottle after bottle down onto the counter. The whiskeys and the vodkas... all of his usuals, neglected for weeks already. None of them seem appealing to him suddenly. They’re all in various states of emptiness and all actors in, and reminders of, the turmoil he’d brought into his own life. But then he finds one bottle, completely untouched, the rice wine that had made him late for the bus the day he met Yuuri, and he knows it has to be this one.

Viktor grabs two glasses and returns to the living room. He passes off the tumblers to Yuuri so his hands are free to pry out the cork and turns the bottle in his hand to display the label.

“I’ve had this forever but haven’t even opened it yet. Maybe it’s a little cliche, serving a Japanese man Japanese alcohol, but isn’t it also sort of perfect?” he grins, albeit a bit shy.

Yuuri looks up at the bottle and immediately lets out a sharp, cut-off “Ah!”, which brings Viktor’s hands to a still as he works to tear the seal away.

“What’s wrong?” Viktor asks, glancing down at the bottle. “No good?”

“Um... no. I mean, it’s fine,” Yuuri says. “It’s just... that’s from my hometown.”

Viktor turns the bottle around again to take in the black brush strokes and castle etched in gold. “Oh,” he says, and then “ _Oh,”_ again when he fully comprehends the meaning.

Smiling awkwardly, Yuuri says, “Actually, that maker had to close down the brewery about half a year ago. He’s gotten too old and has no heir to pass it on to. So that’s become pretty rare.”

“Oh,” Viktor says again as he internally rolls his eyes for not having any better response.

“You should save it for something special,” Yuuri concludes with his own shy smile.

It’s an impulse Viktor can’t control─ doesn’t _want_ to control─ when he bends over and kisses an unsuspecting Yuuri square on the mouth, drawing an adorable yelp from the smaller man.

“I think this is plenty special,” he murmurs against Yuuri’s lips.

* * *

 

The season kicks into a whirlwind after Yuuri leaves Saint Petersburg. Viktor, with renewed motivation, throws himself into Yuri Plisetsky’s newest programs, routines that blow anything Viktor had ever skated completely out of the water. The young Russian sets record after record all season… a season during which Viktor and Yuuri send each other messages often and talk about simple things. How even though Viktor is Russian, he’s actually pretty bad with cold weather. How Minami continued to struggle with clean, consistent landings on his quads (and did Viktor have any advice?). Viktor’s desire to adopt another dog in the near future. The extra kilos Yuuri was having trouble getting rid of after his mother joyfully stuffed him with food when she found out that he’s been speaking to Viktor again.

They meet up when their students’ competitions align and go on coffee dates, always in disguise because the first time they’d walked down a cobblestone street in Italy side by side, they’d been flocked by shocked reporters and news magazine photographers asking a lot of _very hard questions_. Over lattes (or Skype, when their schedules didn’t match), Viktor slowly learns about Yuuri. He loves his family’s pork cutlet recipe and hates fish, which Viktor finds _hilarious_ because isn’t he Japanese? (Yuuri brings up Viktor’s weakness against cold then.) He sneezes in threes and his favorite part about living in the U.S. had been 24-hour gas stations where he’d take a huge reusable cup and fill it for only a dollar with whatever drink had the highest caffeine content on nights he had a paper due for school. He’s self-conscious about the ease with which he gains weight (but Viktor sort of _loves_ it), and the way he pushes his hair back makes Viktor weak in the knees. He has a sharp, sarcastic sense of humor that keeps Viktor on his toes, but he can go from savage to sweet at the drop of a hat. He also apologizes entirely too much, can be a little vindictive when he’s angry and doesn’t think very highly of himself even though he is clearly wonderful.

As the season progresses, brief, stolen kisses in small restaurants and cafes turn into heavy, heated things in dark alleys and hotel doorways. At the World Championships in Shanghai, Yuri becomes a two-time champion (when he presents his gold medal to his coach, Viktor sobs with joy) and Minami medals in his Worlds debut, taking bronze with a sharp-toothed grin. It’s during that trip, after the banquet celebration with their students and colleagues, that Yuuri and Viktor finally discover one another’s bodies in Yuuri’s economy hotel room. It feels like coming home.

When the season is finished, Yuuri enrolls Minami in Yakov─ no, _Viktor’s_ ─ summer camp, but he comes two weeks early at the Russian’s request. They spend those weeks before Minami arrives and Yuuri goes off to stay in a hotel with him in domestic bliss, complete with arguments about dishes and putting the laundry away in a timely fashion. Even when Yuuri isn’t a full-time guest anymore, they sneak off together at any chance they can find. Yuuri has a panic attack one night after making love; it comes on suddenly, triggered by some small thing Viktor doesn’t understand, but he stumbles through what to do for Yuuri and they come out on the other side relatively unscathed. When Yuuri has another one the night before he’s due to fly back to Japan, Viktor catches the warning signs early and is more confident in supporting his lover. Yuuri apologizes for being so needy. Viktor is glad he’s needed.

Not long after, Viktor gets on a plane too, on an invitation from Yuuri to come meet his family (for the second time).

* * *

 

Being in Hasetsu is strange. Everything feels familiar; it’s a weird sort of déjà vu, the kind people talk about when they’re convinced they’ve been somewhere in a past life. The Katsuki family inn, the beach, the riverside, the ice rink...even though he can’t quite remember being there, it somehow still feels nostalgic.

And then there’s Yuuri’s family and friends. It’s obvious they all know Viktor, and the moment Yuuri pulls him into the entryway by hand, they are all over him, speaking so quickly that it dizzies him. Yuuri’s parents go on and on about how sad they'd been, how they’d missed him, how they had hated what Yuuri did, but he’d made up his mind, and could Viktor ever forgive them? Yuuri’s sister and his former ballet instructor apologize too, though with a little less vigor, for phone conversations and text messages that Viktor doesn’t remember. They say they’d only been trying to protect Yuuri, who they obviously treasure, and Viktor can’t really fault them for wanting to do so.

They put him up in “his room,” which sports a sizeable bed and some trinkets Viktor had assumed were lost long ago. But it doesn’t really matter because he spends almost every night tangled up with his lover on Yuuri’s narrow bed while they whisper sweetness into each other’s ears and trail feather-light fingers over naked expanses of skin. One night, Yuuri sighs into Viktor’s chest and tells him how scared he is of being so happy. Viktor promises they’ll stay that way.

It’s this trip, the one that is ending tomorrow so that Viktor can get back to his protege and begin work on the next season, that has told Viktor everything else he needed to know about Yuuri. It’s given him the confidence to do what he has planned next.

Viktor is smiling warmly to himself when the door to the banquet-room-made-bedroom slides open with a soft click of wood on wood and brings him out of his reminiscent musings. Quickly, he stuffs one hand into the pocket of his pale green joggers and turns to smile at the Japanese man leaning against the frame  looking _so good_ in a white tank top and Hawaiian print shorts _._

“Vitka,” Yuuri smiles warmly. “Aren’t you ready yet? Everyone already went down to the beach with the fireworks. They’re waiting for us.”

“Hm? Oh, sorry. Yes. Yes, I’m ready,” Viktor says, shifting on his feet as he tucks back a few stray hairs that have already pulled themselves out of the small bun at the back of his head.

“Good, because this is _your_ goodbye party, you know. Now come on,” Yuuri chides with a grin as he reaches his hand out for the Russian, “or I’ll have to leave you behind.”

With a playful scoff, Viktor takes Yuuri’s hand and allows himself to be pulled forward.

“Don’t you dare think I’d let you forget me here, Yuuri. You can’t get rid of me that easily,” he says as he fingers the two engraved golden bands tucked away in his pocket.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it! Thank you so much for going on this ride with me. I worked really hard on the details of this story and I'm incredibly touched by the interaction and emotional investment a lot of you put into reading this. I hope you're satisfied with the ending. In truth, the original draft of this chapter was half the length and ended with Viktor saying the occasion was plenty special. I intended it to be open-ended and bittersweet. But many of you begged me for a happy ending, and I felt really bad putting you and me and Viktor and Yuuri through the ringer like that. And since I lost this chapter earlier last week and had to rewrite it anyway, I decided to give them the happiest ending I could. It's not perfect. There are consequences for their actions that can't be fixed. But they always come back together, and they get to start over and learn from their past selves. I think they'll be happy this time around. 
> 
> I promised in the comments in an earlier chapter that I'd put a few details here that you may have missed that helped establish the timeline as well as Yuuri's thinking. The rings were one signpost, as was the length of Viktor's hair and Makkachin (who was subtly getting sicker as time went on if you really pay attention). But the biggest one for me was how Yuuri called Viktor. When he first arrives, he uses "Viktor" as usual, but then he starts using "Viten'ka," which Viktor loves. But as things start getting worse, Yuuri, though still using "Viten'ka", doesn't address him by name as often (which is a HC I have for them... they LOVE saying each other's names). That progresses into "Viktor" popping back up toward the end in addition to "Viten'ka", and by the time we get to the day before Viktor goes off to Europeans and then the airport scene, Yuuri is back to just "Viktor." (And now, at the end, he gets a brand new nickname!)
> 
> It sort of killed me to get to the end of this fic because so many of you were (rightly) furious with Yuuri throughout the story, and I wanted to tell you all about how Viktor was ignoring all the signs and was just as much to blame! But you know... spoilers. Anyway, now they're together, they're moving on, and we can all breathe a little easier.
> 
> Thank you again for reading this fic. With this, I'll be taking a hiatus from posting anything new (but not writing) as I embark on a very long, complicated move and job change. But I'm already two (LONG!) chapters into my next fic, which will be a LOT lighter and funnier (but still with a good dose of drama). I can't wait for things to settle down so I can share it with you, and I hope you see you again in the comments then.
> 
> For the time being, you can check out [Dissonance](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10777674/chapters/23905305) (my canon-compliant fill-in-the-series-gaps fic) or come find me on tumblr [@hanarezu-ni!](http://www.hanarezu-ni.tumblr.com)


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